TH  E 


/'.^ 


O 


WISDOM 
OSGAR 
WILDE 


c*7 


OF-I 


* 


11 


LIBRARY 


,  ;'SI7Y  OF 


^lll'^J 


THE   WI  SDOM 

OF 

OSCAR  WILDE 


NOTE 

The  Editor  takes  this  opportunity  to 
thank  Messrs.  G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons, 
the  publishers  of  "De  Profundis,"  for 
their  kindness  in  according  permission 
for  the  reprinting  of  the  extracts 
made  from  that  work. 


THE 

WISDOM 

OF 

OSCAR  WILDE 

SELECTED  WITH 

INTRODUCTION 

AND  INDEX 

BY 

TEMPLE 

SCOTT 

NEW  YORK 
BRENTANO'S.  Inc. 

PUBLISHERS 


Copyright  igod 
By   Breutano's 


PRINTED   IN    THE  UNITED  STATES   OF  AMERICA 


/^SCAR  WILDE,  the  man,  is  dead. 
^^  No  inan  dare  adventure  in  rebellion 
against  the  Society  of  his  fellow-men  un- 
less he  aim  high.  And  even  then  he  may 
often  meet  death,  and  should  expect  it.  But 
Oscar  Wilde's  revolt  was  not  of  this  order. 
It  sent  him  biting  the  dust  and  chewing 
the  bitter  cud  of  salutary  repentance.  It 
was  a  mere  laugh  of  silly  derision,  a  mere 
skipping  of  a  satyr's  hoofs,  a  paltry  snap- 
ping of  the  fingers  in  the  face  of  decency, 
the  ridiculous  antics  of  a  spoilt  and  pam- 
pered youth.  We  waste  our  time  in  giving 
it  even  the  consideration  of  a  reference, 
except  to  note  that  that  part  of  Oscar 
Wilde  is  dead  and  will  soon  have  become 
the  dust  from  which  it  came.  If  haply, 
it  feed  some  rose  to  bloom  redder,  that  is 
as  much  as  need  concern  us. 
But  the  writings  of  Oscar  Wilde,  those 
emanations  of  the  real  being  that  gave 
life  to  the  artist  and  constituted  what  we 
call  his  ''soul",  if  these  have  anything  in 
them  that  is  for  us,  not  only  should  we  not 
reject  it,  but  it  is  for  our  necessity  and 


Introduc- 
tion 


Introduc- 
tion 


our  salvation  that  we  accept  it.  The  dust 
of  Imperial  Caesar  may  "  patch  a  wall 
t'expel  the  winter's  flaw,"  but  his  soul 
must  go  on  through  the  ages,  because  it 
is  of  that  fire  which  consumes  those  who 
attempt  to  extinguish  it. 
To  speak  thus  by  way  of  comparison  is 
hardly  an  exaggeration.  The  author  of 
"  Intentions  "  and  ^'  The  Soul  of  j\Ian 
Under  Socialism "  enunciated  a  new 
theory  of  art  and  a  new  dogma  of  life. 
He  revalued  our  values  with  the  insight 
of  genius ;  and  if  he  sometimes  indulged 
himself  in  persiflage  it  w^as  by  way  of  aside 
and  due  to  the  humorous  play  of  the  Irish- 
man in  him.  He  was  a  creator  of  no 
mean  order  as  his  Poems  amply  testify. 
There  is  no  more  directly  appealing  ballad 
in  the  English  language  than  that  of 
"  Reading  Gaol."  His  power  of  dramatic 
composition  is  extraordinary  in  his  plays, 
and  the  lovely  allegories  and  tales  of  the 
"  Happy  Prince  "  and  "  The  House  of 
Pomegranates  "  are  among  the  master- 
pieces of  that  class  of  literature. 


But  I  do  not  wish  now  to  attempt  a  de- 
tailed appreciation  of  the  works  of  Oscar 
Wilde.  I  wish  simply  to  ask  the  reader 
to  judge  for  himself  and  see  if  he  can  not 
find  in  what  is  here  presented  to  him  a 
justification  for  their  preservation. 
"Society,  as  we  have  constituted  it,  will 
have  no  place  for  me,  has  none  to 
offer ;  but  Nature,  whose  sweet  rains 
fall  on  unjust  and  just  alike,  will  have 
clefts  in  the  rock  where  I  may  hide,  and 
sweet  valleys  in  whose  silence  I  may  weep 
undisturbed.  She  will  hang  the  night 
with  stars  so  that  I  may  walk  abroad  in 
the  darkness  without  stumbling,  and  send 
the  wind  over  my  footprints  so  that  none 
may  track  me  to  my  hurt ;  she  will  cleanse 
me  in  great  waters,  and  with  bitterness 
make  me  whole." 

These  words  should  not  appeal  to  us  in 
vain.  Let  us  take  the  part  Nature  takes 
and  receive  him  with  passionless  courtesy. 
Let  us  not  play  with  the  fire  of  this  soul. 
We  owe  it  a  temple.  If,  by  chance,  some 
render    of    this    little   book    shall    find    it 


rntroduc- 
tion 


Introduc- 
tion 


worthy,  he  may  rest  assured  that  he  is  do- 
ing justice  to  himself  as  well  as  to  the 
writer;  he  is  but  paying  homage  to  a 
thinker  and  an  artist.  Let  him  rather  give 
thanks  that  he  has  that  in  him  which  is  not 
only  able  to  be  just  but  also  free  to  accept 
that  which  is  true.  Nothing  so  finely 
touches  us  to  fine  issues  as  a  fine  spirit — 
and  the  spirit  of  Oscar  Wilde  is  fine  in- 
deed. 

Temple  Scott. 


TT  is  a  curious  thing  about  the  game  of 
marriage — a  game,  by  the  way,  that  is 
going  out  of  fashion — the  wives  hold  all 
the  honours  and  invariably  lose  the  odd 
trick.   Lady  irimicnucrc's  Fan. 

++ 

\T7'Oi\IEX  are  pictures;  men  are  prob- 
^^  lems :  if  you  want  to  know  what  a 
woman  really  means,  look  at  her,  don't 
listen  to  her.  A  Woman  of  Xo  Inipor- 
taiicc. 


Marriage 


Women 


A  LL  women  become  like  their  mothers 
-^^  — that  is  their  tragedy.  No  man 
does.  That's  his.  TJic  Iniporfaucc  of  Be- 
ing Earnest. 

npIIERE  is  only  one  real  tragedy  in  a 

woman's  life.    The  fact  that  her  past 

is  always  her  lover,  and   her  future   in- 

variablv  her  husband.   Aii  Ideal  Husband. 


A 


MERICA  is  a  Paradise  for  women — 
that  is  whv,  like  Eve,  the  American 


The  Poet 
— the  Ar- 
tistic 
Spirit  in 
the  Choice 
of  Subject 
— the 
Spectator 
of  all 
Time  and 
all  Exist- 
ence 


women  are  extremly  anxious  to  get  out 
of  it.   A  IVoniaii  of  No  Importance. 

IVyTEN  always  want  to  be  a  woman's 
^^^  first  love — women  like  to  be  a  man's 
last  romance.  A  IVuiiiaji  of  No  Impor- 
tance. 

/^XE  should  never  trust  a  woman  who 
^^  tells  her  own  age.  A  woman  who 
would  tell  that  would  tell  anything.  A 
Woman  of  No  Importance. 


\X7'0MEN  have  a  much  better  time  than 
^  ^  men    in   this    world ;   there   are   far 
more  things  forbidden  them.     A  Woman 
of  No  Importance. 

++ 
T  IKE  the  philosopher  of  the  platonic 
"*-^  vision,  the  poet  is  the  spectator  of  all 
time  and  all  existence.  For  him  no  form 
is  obsolete,  no  subject  out  of  date;  rather, 
whatever  of  life  and  passion  the  world  has 
known  in  the  desert  of  Judea  or  in  Ar- 
cadian valley,  by  the  ruins  of  Troy  or 
Damascus,   in  the  crowded  and  hideous 


streets  of  the  modern  city,  or  by  the  pleas- 
ant ways  of  Camelot,  all  lies  before  him 
like  an  open  scroll,  all  is  still  instinct  with 
beautiful  life.  He  will  take  of  it  what  is 
salutary  for  his  owi  spirit,  choosing  some 
facts  and  rejecting  others,  with  a  calm 
artistic  control  of  one  who  is  in  possession 
of  the  secret  of  beauty  .  .  .  Art  is 
very  life  itself  and  knows  nothing  of 
death.  And  so  it  comes  that  he  who 
seems  to  stand  most  remote  from  his  age 
is  he  who  mirrors  it  best,  because  he  has 
stripped  life  of  that  mist  of  familiarity 
which,  as  Shelley  used  to  say,  makes  life 
obscure  to  us.  Lecture  on  tJic  English 
Renaissance. 

++ 

L^^  OR  there  is  something  Hellenic  in 
your  air  and  world,  something  that 
has  a  quicker  breath  of  the  joy  and  power 
of  Elizabeth's  England  about  it  than  our 
ancient  civilisation  can  give  us.  For  you, 
at  least,  are  young;  no  hungry  generations 
weigh  you  down,  and  the  past  does  not 


America, 
I'erhaps  to 
be   tlic 
Perfcctcr 

' of  the 

I  Movement 

'  oi  the 
Knglish 
Renais- 
sance in 
Art 


Suffering 


mock  you  with  the  ruins  of  a  beauty,  the 
secret  of  whose  creation  you  have  lost. 
That  very  absence  of  tradition  which  Rus- 
kin  thought  would  rob  your  rivers  of  their 
laughter  and  your  flowers  of  their  light 
may  be  rather  the  source  of  your  freedom 
and  strength.  To  speak  in  literature  with 
the  perfect  rectitude  of  the  movement  of 
animals,  and  the  unimpeachableness  of 
the  sentiments  of  tree,  and  grass  by  the 
roadside,  has  been  defined  by  one  of  your 
poets  as  the  flawless  triumph  of  art ;  it  is 
a  triumph  which  you  above  all  other  na- 
tions may  be  destined  to  achieve.  For  the 
voices  that  have  their  dwelling  in  sea  and 
mountain  are  not  the  chosen  music  of  lib- 
erty only.  Other  messages  are  there,  if 
you  will  but  listen  to  them — may  yield 
you  the  splendour  of  some  new  imagina- 
tion, and  the  marvel  of  some  new  liberty. 
Lecture  on  the  English  Renaissance. 

++ 
C  UFFERING    is    really    a    revelation. 
^  One    discerns    things    one    never    dis- 


cerned  before.  One  approaches  the  whole 
of  history  from  a  different  standpoint. 
What  one  had  felt  dimly,  through  instinct, 
about  art,  is  intellectually  and  emotionally 
realised  with  perfect  clearness  of  vision 
and  absolute  intensity  of  apprehension. 
Dc  Profundis. 

"Who  never  ate  his  bread  in  sorrow. 
Who  never  spent  the  midnight  hours 

Weeping  and  v.aitinj^   for  the  morrow, — 
He  knows  you  not,  ye  heavenly  powers." 

+  + 

T  XOW  see  that  sorrow,  being  the  su- 
preme  emotion  of  which  man  is  ca- 
pable, is  at  once  the  type  and  test  of  all 
great  art.  What  the  artist  is  always  look- 
ing for  is  the  mode  of  existence  in  which 
soul  and  body  are  one  and  indivisible :  in 
which  the  outward  is  expressive  of  the  in- 
ward :  in  which  form  reveals.  Dc  Pro- 
fundis. 

++ 
T>EHIXD  joy  and  laughter  there  may 
'*-'  be  a  temperament,  coarse,  hard,  and 
callous.     But  behind  sorrow  there  is  al- 
ways sorrow.   Pain,  unlike  pleasure,  wears 


The  aim 
of  the 
artist  is 
best  real- 
ised 

through 
sorrow 


Sorrow 
the  ulti- 
mate type 
in  life  and 
in  art 


Truth  in 
Art 


The  Com- 
plete Man 
The  Per- 
fect Per- 
sonality 


The  man 
who  exer- 
cises au- 
thority is 
the  man 
who  re- 
sists au- 
thority 


no  mask.  Truth  in  art  is  not  any  cor- 
respondence between  the  essential  idea 
and  the  accidental  existence.  .  .  . 
Truth  in  art  is  the  unity  of  a  thing  with 
itself :  the  outward  rendered  expressive 
of  the  inward :  the  soul  made  incarnate : 
the  body  instinct  with  spirit.  For  this 
reason  there  is  no  truth  comparable  to  sor- 
row .  .  .  out  of  sorrow  have  the 
worlds  been  built,  and  at  the  birth  of  a 
child  or  a  star  there  is  pain.  De  Profimdis. 

++ 

TT  is  a  question  whether  we  have  ever 
■^  seen  the  full  expression  of  a  personality, 
except  on  the  imaginative  plane  of  art. 
In  action  we  never  have.  Caesar,  says 
Mommsen,  was  the  complete  and  perfect 
man.  But  how  tragically  insecure  was 
Caesar!  \Mierever  there  is  a  man  who 
exercises  authority,  there  is  a  man  who 
resists  authority.  Caesar  was  very  per- 
fect, but  his  perfection  travelled  by  too 
dangerous  a  road.  Marcus  Aurelius  was 
the  perfect  man,  says  Renan.     Yes;  the 


great  emperor  was  a  perfect  man.  But 
how  intolerable  were  the  endless  claims 
upon  him !  He  staggered  under  the  bur- 
den of  the  empire.  He  was  conscious  how 
inadequate  one  man  was  to  Ijear  the 
weight  of  that  Titan  and  too  vast  orb. 
What  I  mean  by  a  perfect  man  is  one 
who  develops  under  perfect  conditions ; 
one  who  is  not  wounded,  or  worried,  or 
maimed,  or  in  danger.  Most  personal- 
ities have  been  obliged  to  be  rebels.  Half 
their  strength  has  been  wasted  in  fric- 
tion ...  It  will  be  a  marvellous  thing 
— the  true  personality  of  jnan — when  we 
see  it.  It  will  grow  naturally  and  simply, 
as  a  tree  grows.  It 
discord.  It  will  never 
It  will  not  prove  things, 
everything.  And  yet 
,  not  busy  itself  about  knowl- 
It  will  have  wisdom.  Its  value  will 
not  be  measured  by  material  things.  It 
will  have  nothing.  And  yet  it  will  have 
everything,  and  whatever  one  takes  from 
it,   it  will  still  have,   so  rich  will  it  be. 


flower-like,    or 
will   not   be   at 
argue  or  dispute 
It"  wi 
it    wi 
edge. 


ill     know 


Man's 

Real 

Perfection 


The  Evils 

of 

Altruism 


It  will  not  be  always  meddling  with  others, 
or  asking  them  to  be  like  itself.  It  will 
love  them  because  they  will  be  different. 
And  yet,  while  it  will  not  meddle  with 
others,  it  will  help  all,  as  a  beautiful  thing 
helps  us  by  being  w^hat  it  is.  The  person- 
ality of  man  will  be  very  w^onderful.  It 
will  be  as  wonderful  as  the  personality  of 
a  child.  The  Soul  of  Man  under  Social- 
ism. 

++ 

'T^HE  true  perfection  of  man  lies,  not 
^  in  what  man  has,  but- in  what  man 
is  .  .  .  Nothing  should  be  able  to 
harm  a  man  except  himself.  Nothing 
should  be  able  to  rob  a  man  at  all.  What 
a  man  really  has,  is  what  is  in  him.  What 
is  outside  of  him  should  be  a  matter  of 
no  importance.  The  Soul  of  Man  Under 
Socialism. 

++ 

'VrOW  and  then,  in  the  course  of  the 
-^^  century,  a  great  man  of  science,  like 
Darwin ;  a  great  poet,  like  Keats ;  a  fine 


criiical  ;.[)irit,  like  M.  Rcnaii  ;  a  supreme 
artist,  like  Fkuiljert,  has  been  able  to  iso- 
late himself,  to  keep  himself  out  of  reaeh 
of  the  clamorous  claims  of  others,  to  stand 
"  under  the  shelter  of  the  wall,"  as  Plato 
puts  it,  and  so  to  realise  the  perfection  of 
what  was  in  him,  to  his  own  incomparable 


cr 


gain,  and  to  the  incomparable  and  lastm^, 
ain  of  the  whole  world.     These,  how- 


to 


ever,,  are  exceptions.  The  majority  of 
people  spoil  their  lives  by  an  unhealthy 
and  exaggerated  altruism — are  forced,  in- 
deed, so  to  spoil  them.  They  find  them- 
selves surrounded  by  hideous  poverty,  by 
hideous  ugliness,  by  hideous  starvation. 
It  is  inevitable  that  they  should  be 
strongly  moved  by  all  this.  The  emotions 
of  man  are  stirred  more  quickly  than 
man's  intelligence;  and,  .  .  .  it  is  much 
more  easy  to  have  sympathy  with  suffer- 
ing than  it  is  to  have  sympathy  with 
thought.  Accordingly,  with  admirable, 
though  misdirected  intentions,  they  very 
seriously  and  very  sentimentally  set  them- 
selves to  the  task  of  remedying  the  evils 


that  they  see.  But  their  remedies  do  not 
cure  the  disease :  they  merely  prolong  it. 
Indeed,  their  remedies  are  part  of  the 
disease. 

They  try  to  solve  the  problem  of  pov- 
erty, for  instance,  by  keeping  the  poor 
alive;  or,  in  the  case  of  a  very  advanced 
school,  by  amusing  the  poor. 
But  this  is  not  a  solution :  it  is  an  aggrava- 
tion of  the  difficulty.  The  proper  aim  is 
to  try  and  reconstruct  society  on  such 
a  basis  that  poverty  will  be  impossible. 
And  the  altruistic  virtues  have  really  pre- 
vented the  carrying  out  of  this  aim  .  .  . 
The  people  who  do  most  harm  are  the 
people  who  try  to  do  most  good  .  .  . 
charity  degrades  and  demoralizes  .  .  . 
charity  creates  a  multitude  of  sins  .  .  . 
It  is  immoral  to  use  private  property  in 
order  to  alleviate  the  horrible  evils  that 
result  from  the  institution  of  private  prop- 
erty. It  is  both  immoral  and  unfair.  TJie 
Soul  of  Man  Under  Socialisiii. 

++ 

10 


(^  {j\\  very  dress  makes  its  grotesc|ue. 
^^  W'c  are  the  zanies  of  sorrow.  \\'e 
are  clow  ns  whose  hearts  are  broken  .  .  . 
To  those  who  are  in  prison  tears  are 
a  part  of  every  day's  experience.  A  day 
in  prison  on  which  one  does  not  weep  is 
a  day  on  which  one's  heart  is  hard,  not  a 
(kiy  on  which  one's  heart  is  happy.  Dc 
Profundis. 

++ 
'T^HK  Phihstine  element  in  life  is  not 
"''  the  failure  to  understand  art. 
He  is  the  Philistine  who  upholds  and  aids 
the  heavy,  cumbrous,  blind,  mechanical 
forces  of  society,  and  who  does  not  rec(\^- 
nise  dynamic  force  when  he  meets  it  either 
in  a  man  or  a  movement.    Dc  Profundis. 

A  MAX  whose  desire  is  to  be  some- 
-^^  thino;-  separate  from  himself,  to  be  a 
member  of  Parliament,  or  a  successful 
grocer,  or  a  prominent  lawyer  or  a  judge, 
or  something  ecjually  tedious,  invariably 
succeeds  in  beincr  what  he  wants  to  be. 


Dress  of 

Inmates 
of  Pris- 
ons 


The  Phil- 
listine 


Relation 
of  the  .Ar- 
tistic I.ifc 
to  Con- 
duct 


11 


The  Soul 
of  a  Man 
is  Un- 
knowable 


Friend- 
ship  the 
Right    to 
Share  An- 
other's Sor- 
row 


I  That  is  his  punishment.  Those  who  want 
a  mask  have  to  wear  it. 
But  with  the  dynamic  forces  of  hfe,  and 
those  in  whom  those  dynamic  forces  be- 
come incarnate,  it  is  different.  People 
whose  desire  is  solely  for  self-realisation 
never  know  where  they  are  going.  They 
can't  know\  .  .  The  final  mystery  is 
oneself.  When  one  has  weighed  the  sun 
in  the  balance,  and  measured  the  steps  of 
the  moon,  and  mapped  out  the  seven 
heavens  star  by  star,  there  still  remains 
oneself.  Who  can  calculate  the  orbit  of 
one's  own  soul?  When  the  son  went  out 
to  look  for  his  father's  asses,  he  did  not 
know  that  a  man  of  God  was  waiting  for 
him  with  the  very  chrism  of  coronation, 
and  that  his  own  soul  was  already  the 
soul  of  a  King.     De  Proftindis. 


L. 


++ 


TF  a  friend  of  mine 


gave  a  feast, 


and  did  not  invite  me  to  it,  I  should 
not  mind  a  bit  .  .  .  But  if  ...  a 
friend  of  mine  had  a  sorrow  and  refused 


12 


to  allow  me  to  share  it,  I  should  feel  it 
most  bitterly.  If  he  shut  the  doors  of  the 
house  of  mourning  against  me,  1  would 
move  back  again  and  again  and  beg  to  be 
admitted,  so  that  I  might  share  in  what 
I  was  entitled  to  share.  If  he  thought 
me  unworthy,  unfit  to  weep  with  him,  I 
should  feel  it  as  the  most  poignant  humil- 
iation, as  the  most  terrible  mode  for  which 
disgrace  could  be  inflicted  on  me  . 
ho  who  can  look  on  the  loveliness  of  the 
world  and  share  its  sorrow,  and  realise 
something  of  the  wonder  of  both,  is  in  im- 
mediate contact  with  divine  things,  and 
has  got  as  near  to  God's  secret  as  any 
one  can  get.    Do  Profimdis. 

++ 

'T^HOSE   who   see   any    difference   be- 

'*'    tween  soul  and  body,   have  neither. 

Phrases  and  riiilosopJiics  for  the  use  of 


the  Yoiiiig 


++ 


TIR   well-bred   contradict    other   peo-' 
pie.    The  wise  contradict  themselves. 


Soul  and 

I?od>— 

One 


Contra- 
diction 


13 


Style 
Essential 


Industry 


The  Three 
Ages 


Reading 


Phrases  and  Philosophies  for  the  Use  of 


the  Yoiuig. 


++ 


TN  all  unimportant  matters,  style,  not 
"■■  sincerity,  is  the  essential.  In  all  im- 
portant matters,  style,  not  sincerity,  is  the 
essential.  In  matters  of  grave  importance, 
style,  not  sincerity,  is  the  vital  thing. 
Phrases  and  Philosophies  for  the  Use  of 


the  Young. 


++ 


TXDUSTRY  is  the  root  of  all  ugliness. 
■■•  Phrases  and  Philosophies  for  the  Use 
of  the  Young. 

++ 

'TpHE  old  believe  everything:  the  mid- 
'*'    die-aged     suspect     everything;     the 
young    know    everything.     Phrases    and 
PJiilosophies  for  the  Use  of  the  Young. 

++ 

T  T  is  absurd  to  have  a  hard-and-fast  rule 
'''  about  what  one  should  read  and  what 
one  shouldn't.    More  than  half  of  modern 


14 


culture  depends  on  what  one  shouldn't 
read.  Phrases  and  Philosophies  for  the 
Use  of  the  Young. 

++ 

\X7'0MEN  have  a  wonderful  instinct 
^^  about  things.  They  can  discover 
everything  except  the  obvious.  In  the 
case  of  a  very  fascinating  woman,  sex  is 
a  challenge,  not  a  defence.  Phrases  and 
Philosophies  for  the  Use  of  the  Young. 

++ 

'T^HE  most  joyous  poet  is  not  he  who 
''*  sows  the  desolate  highways  of  this 
world  with  the  barren  seed  of  laughter, 
but  he  who  makes  his  sorrow  most  musi- 
cal, this  indeed  being  the  meaning  of  joy 
in  art — that  incommunicable  element  of 
artistic  delight  which,  in  poetry  for  in- 
stance, comes  from  what  Keats  called,  the 
"  sensuous  life  of  verse,"  the  element  of 
song  in  the  singing,  made  so  pleasurable 
to  us  by  that  wonder  of  motion  which 
often  has  its  origin  in  mere  musical  im- 

15 


Women 


The  Poet 
of  Joy 


Artistic 
Expres- 
sion in 
Painting 


pulse,  and  in  painting  is  to  be  sought  for, 
from  the  subject  never,  but  from  the  pic- 
torial charm  only  .  .  .  L' Envoi  to 
"Rose  Leaf  and  Apple  Leaf." 

++ 

13  EJECTS  all  literary  reminiscence  and 
'''^  all  metaphysical  idea,  is  in  itself  en- 
tirely satisfying  to  the  aesthetic  sense — 
is,  as  the  Greeks  would  say,  an  end  in 
itself  .  .  .  the  art  whose  subject 
cannot  be  separated  from  the  method  of 
its  expression ;  the  art  which  most  com- 
pletely realises  for  us  the  artistic  ideal 
.  the  rule  of  art  is  not  the  rule  of 
morals.  In  an  ethical  system,  indeed,  of 
any  gentle  mercy  good  intentions  will,  ore 
is  fain  to  fancy,  have  their  recognition : 
but  of  those  that  would  enter  the  serene 
House  of  Beauty  the  cjuestion  that  we  ask 
is  not  what  they  had  ever  meant  to  do.  but 
what  they  had  done.  Their  pathetic  inten- 
tions are  of  no  value  to  us,  but  their 
realised  creations  only.  L'Envoi  to  ''Rose 
Leaf  and  Apple  Leaf." 


16 


'^rOR,  ill  looking  at  a  work  of  art, 
^^  shoukl  we  be  dreaming  of  what  it 
synil)olises  but  rather  k)ving  it  for  what  it 
is.  Indeeck  the  transcendental  spirit  is 
alien  to  the  spirit  of  Art.  The  metaphysi- 
cal mind  of  Asia  may  create  for  itself  the 
monstrous  and  many-breasted  idol,  but  to 
the  Greek,  pure  artist,  that  work  is  most 
instinct  with  spiritual  life  which  conforms 
most  closely  to  the  perfect  facts  of  physical 
life  also.  Nor,  in  its  primary  aspect,  has 
a  painting,  for  instance,  any  more  spiritual 
message  or  meaning  for  us  than  a  blue  tile 
from  the  wall  of  Damascus,  or  a  Hitzen 
vase.  It  is  a  beautifully  coloured  surface, 
nothing  more,  and  affects  us  by  no  sugges- 
tion stolen  from  philosophy,  no  pathos 
pilfered  from  literature,  no  feeling  filched 
from  a  poet,  but  by  its  own  incommuni- 
cable artistic  essence — by  that  selection  of 
truth  which  we  call  style,  and  that  relation 
of  values  which  is  the  draughtsmanship  of 
])ainting,  by  the  whole  (|uality  of  the  work- 
manship, the  arabes([ue  of  the  design,  the 
splendour  of  the  colour;  iov  these  things 


What  is 
Art?  And 
How  Sh.-ill 
We  Look 
at  Art? 


17 


Sincerity 
and  Con- 
stancy in 
Art.  Con- 
stancy in 
Belief 


are  enough  to  stir  the  most  divine  and  re- 
mote of  the  chords  which  make  music  in 
our  soul ;  and  colour,  indeed,  is  of  itself  a 
mystical  presence  in  things,  and  tone  a 
kind  of  sentiment.  L'Ejiz'oi  to  "Rose  Leaf 
ajid  Apple  Leaf." 

++ 

CIXCERITY  and  constancy  will  the 
^  artist  indeed,  have  always  :  but  sincerity 
in  art  is  merely  that  plastic  perfection  of 
execution  without  which  a  poem  or  a 
painting,  however  noble  its  sentiment  or 
liuman  its  origin,  is  but  wasted  and  unreal 
work,  and  the  constancy  of  the  artist  can- 
not be  to  any  definite  rules  or  system  of 
living,  but  to  that  principle  of  beauty 
through  which  the  inconstant  shadows 
of  his  life  are,  in  their  most  fleeting  mo- 
ment, arrested  and  made  permanent.  He 
will  not,  for  instance,  in  intellectual  mat- 
ters, acquiesce  in  that  facile  orthodoxy  of 
our  day  which  is  so  reasonable  and  so 
artistically  uninteresting:  nor  yet  will  he 
desire  that  fiery  faith  of  the  antique  time 


18 


which,  while  it  intensified,  yet  limited  the 
\  ision ;  still  less  will  he  allow  the  calm  of 
his  culture  to  be  marred  by  the  discordant 
despair  of  doubt  or  the  sadness  of  a 
sterile  skepticism ;  for  the  \'alley  Peril- 
ous, where  ignorant  armies  clash  by  night, 
is  no  resting  place  meet  for  her  to  whom 
the  gods  have  assigned  the  clear  upland, 
the  serene  height,  and  the  sunht  air. 
Rather  will  he  be  always  curiously  testing 
new  forms  of  belief,  tingeing  his  nature 
with  the  sentiment  that  still  lingers  about 
some  beautiful  creeds,  and,  searching  for 
experience  itself,  and  not  for  the  fruits  of 
experience,  when  he  has  got  its  secret,  he 
will  leave  without  regret,  much  that  was 
(^nce  very  precious  to  him.  L'Enz'oi  to 
"Rose  Leaf  and  Apple  Leaf." 

++ 

^X7E  are  often  told  that  the  poor  are 
^^  grateful  for  charity.  Some  of  them 
are,  no  doubt,  but  the  best  amongst  the 
poor  are  never  grateful.  They  are  un- 
grateful, discontented,  disobedient,  and  re- 


Charity 


Discon- 
tent in  the 
poor  a 
healthy 
sign 


I  Disobe- 
'  dience 


man  s  orig- 
inal virtue 


Thrift  to 
the  poor 
is  asking  a 
starving      I 
man  to  eat 
less 


bellious.  They  are  quite  right  to  be-  so. 
Charity  they  feel  to  be  a  ridiculously  in- 
adequate mode  of  partial  restitution,  or  a 
sentimental  dole,  usually  accompanied  by 
some  impertinent  attempt  on  the  part  of 
the  sentimentalists  to  tyrannise  over  their 
private  lives.  W^hy  should  they  be  grate- 
ful for  the  crumbs  that  fall  from  the  rich 
man's  table  ?  They  should  be  seated  at  the 
board,  and  are  beginning  to  know  it.  As 
for  being  discontented,  a  man  who  would 
not  be  discontented  with  such  surround- 
ings, and  such  a  low  mode  of  life  would 
be  a  perfect  brute.  Disobedience,  in  the 
eyes  of  any  one  who  has  read  history,  is 
man's  original  virtue.  It  is  through  dis- 
obedience that  progress  has  been  made, 
through  disobedience  and  through  rebel- 
lion. Sometimes  the  poor  are  praised  for 
being  thrifty.  But  to  recommend  thrift 
to  the  poor  is  both  grotesque  and  insulting. 
It  is  like  advising  a  man  who  is  starving  to 
eat  less.  For  a  town  or  country  labourer 
to  practice  thrift  would  be  absolutely  im- 
moral.   Man  should  not  be  readv  to  show 


20 


llial  lie  can  live  like  a  badly-fed  animal. 
He  shunld  decline  to  live  like  that. 
N(j :  a  puor  man  who  is  unii^rateful,  un- 
thrifty, discontented,  and  rebellious  is 
])rubably  a  real  personality,  and  has  much 
in  him.  He  is,  at  any  rate,  a  healthy 
protest.  The  Soul  of  Man  luulcr  Social- 
is  Jii. 

++ 


I 


]MUST  confess  that  I  like  all  mem- 
oirs. I  like  them  for  their  form,  just 
as  much  as  for  their  matter.  In  literature 
mere  egotism  is  delightful.  It  is  what 
fascinates  us  in  the  letters  of  personalities 
so  different  as  Cicero  and  Balzac.  Flaubert 
and  Berlioz,  Byron  and  Madame  de 
Sevigne.  Whenever  we  come  across  it, 
and,  strangely  enough,  it  is  rather  rare,  we 
cannot  but  welcome  it,  and  do  not  easily 
forget  it.  Humanity  will  always  love 
Rousseau  for  having  confessed  his  sins, 
not  to  a  priest,  but  to  the  world,  and  the 
couchant  nymphs  that  Cellini  wrought  in 
bronze  for  the  castle  of  King  Francis,  the 


Autobiog- 
raphies 


21 


green  and  gold  Perseus,  even,  lliat  in  the 
open  Loggia  at  Florence  shows  the  nioun 
the  dead  terror  that  once  turned  life  to 
stone,  have  not  given  it  more  pleasure  than 
has  that  autobiography  in  which  the  su- 
preme scoundrel  of  the  Renaissance  re- 
lates the  story  of  his  splendour  and  his 
shame.  The  opinions,  the  character,  the 
achievements  of  the  man,  matter  very 
little.  He  may  be  a  sceptic  like  the  gentle 
Sieur  de  Alontaigne,  or  a  saint  like  the 
bitter  son  of  Monica,  but  when  he  tells  us 
his  own  secrets  he  can  always  charm  our 
ears  to  listening  and  our  lips  to  silence. 
The  mode  of  thought  that  Cardinal  Xew- 
man  represented — if  that  can  be  called  a 
mode  of  thought  which  seeks  to  solve  in- 
tellectual problems  by  a  denial  of  the  su- 
premacy of  intellect — may  not,  cannot  I 
think,  survive.  But  the  world  will  never 
w^eary  of  watching  that  troubled  soul  in 
its  progress  from  darkness  to  darkness. 
The  lonely  church  at  Littlemore,  where 
''the  breath  of  the  morning  is  damp,  and 
worshippers  are  few,"  w^ill  always  be  dear 

22 


to  it,  and  wlienevcr  men  sec  the  yellow 
snapdragon  blossoming  on  the  wall  of 
Trinity  they  will  think  of  that  gracious 
undergraduate  who  saw  in  the  flower's 
sure  recurrence  a  prophecy  that  he  would 
abide  forever  with  the  Benign  Mother  of 
his  days — a  prophecy  that  Faith,  in  her 
wisdom  or  her  folly,  suffered  not  to  be  ful- 
filled. Yes ;  autobiography  is  irresistible. 
Toor,  silly,  conceited  Mr.  Secretary  Pepys 
has  chattered  his  way  into  the  circle  of  the 
Immortals,  and,  conscious  that  indiscretion 
is  the  better  part  of  valour,  bustles  about 
among  them  in  that  ''shaggy  purple  gown 
^\  ith  gold  buttons  and  looped  lace"  which 
he  is  so  fond  of  describing  to  us,  perfectly 
at  his  ease,  and  prattling,  to  his  own  and 
our  infinite  pleasure,  of  the  Indian  blue 
petticoat  that  he  bought  for  his  wife,  of 
the  "good  hog's  harslet,"  and  the  ''pleas- 
ant French  fricassee  of  veal"  that  he  loved 
to  eat,  of  his  game  of  bowls  with  Will 
Joyce,  and  his  "gadding  after  beauties," 
and  his  reciting  of  Ilaudct  on  a  Sunday, 
and  his  playing  of  the  viol  on  week  days, 


Art  is  the 
Product 
of  Delib- 
erate Self- 
Conscious- 
ness 


and  other  wicked  or  trivial  things.  Even 
in  actual  life  egotism  is  not  without  its 
attractions.  When  people  talk  to  us 
about  others  they  are  usually  dull.  When 
they  talk  to  us  about  themselves  they  are 
nearly  always  interesting,  and  if  one  could 
shut  them  up,  when  they  become  weari- 
some, as  easily  as  one  can  shut  up  a  book 
of  which  one  has  grown  wearied,  they 
would  be  perfect  absolutely.  Intentions. 
The  Critie  as  Artist. 

++ 

A  LL  fine  imaginative  work  is  self-con- 
'^  scious  and  deliberate.  No  poet  sings 
because  he  must  sing.  At  least  no  great 
poet  does.  A  great  poet  sings  because  he 
chooses  to  sing.  It  is  so  now,  and  it  has 
always  been  so.  We  are  sometimes  apt  to 
think  that  the  voices  that  sounded  at  the 
dawn  of  poetry  were  simpler,  fresher,  and 
more  natural  than  ours,  and  that  the  world 
which  the  early  poets  looked  at,  and 
through  which  they  worked,  had  a  kind  of 
poetical   quality   of  its  own,   and  almost 


u 


without  clianging  could  pass  into  song. 
Tlic  snow  lies  thick  now  upon  Olympus, 
and  its  steep  scarped  sides  are  bleak  and 
barren,  but  once,  we  fancy,  the  white  feet 
of  the  Muses  brushed  the  dew  from  the 
anemones  in  the  morning,  and  at  evening 
came  Apollo  to  sing  to  the  shepherds  in  the 
vale.  But  in  this  we  are  merely  lending 
to  other  ages  what  we  desire,  or  think  we 
desire,  for  our  own.  Our  historical  sense 
is  at  fault.  Every  century  that  produces 
l)oetry  is,  so  far,  an  artificial  century,  and 
the  work  that  seems  to  us  to  be  the  most 
natural  and  simple  product  of  its  time  is 
always  the  result  of  the  most  self-con- 
sci(nis  effort.  Lifoitions.  The  Critic  as 
.-Artist. 

++ 


T    KNOW  not  whether  Laws  be  right, 
-^     Or  whether  Laws  be  wrong; 
All  that  we  know  who  lie  in  gaol 

Ls  that  the  wall  is  strong ; 
And  that  each  day  is  like  a  year, 

A  vear  whose  days  are  long. 


The  Influ- 
ence of 
Prison 
and  Pris- 
on Life  on 
Society 


But  this  I  know,  that  every  Law 
That  men  ha\"e  made  for  Man, 

Since   first   Man   took   his  brother's   hfe, 
And  the  sad  world  began, 

But  straw^s  the  wheat  and  saves  the  chaff 
With  a  most  evil  fan. 

This  too  I  know — and  wise  it  were 
If  each  could  know  the  same — 

That  every  prison  that  men  build 
Is  built  w^th  bricks  of  shame. 

And  bound  with  bars  lest  Christ  should 
see 
How  men  their  brothers  maim. 

With  bars  they  blur  the  gracious  moon, 

And  blind  the  goodly  sun : 
And  they  do  well  to  hide  their  Hell, 

For  in  it  things  are  done 
That  Son  of  God  nor  Son  of  Man 

Ever  should  look  upon! 


The  vilest  deeds  like  poison  words 
Bloom  well  in  prison-air  : 

26 


It  is  only  what  is  good  in  Man 
That  wastes  and  withers  there  : 

J 'ale  Anguish  keeps  the  heavy  gate, 
And  the  Warder  is  Despair. 

For  they  starve  the  httle  frightened  child 
Till  it  weeps  both  night  and  day : 

And  they  scourge  the  weak,  and  flog  the 
fool, 
And  gibe  the  old  and  gray, 

And  some  grow  mad,  and  all  grow  bad, 
And  none  a  word  may  say. 

Each  narrow  cell  in  which  we  dwell 

Is  a  foul  and  dark  latrine, 
And  the  fetid  breath  of  living  Death 

Chokes  up  each  grated  screen, 
And  all,  but  Lust,  is  turned  to  dust 

In  Plumanity's  machine. 

The  brackish  water  that  we  drink 
Creeps  with  a  loathsome  slime. 

And  the  bitter  bread  they  weigh  in  scales 
Is  full  of  chalk  and  lime, 


27 


And  Sleep  will  not  lie  down,  bnt  walks 
Wild-eved,  and  cries  to  Time. 


And  every  human  heart  that  breaks, 

In  prison-cell  or  yard, 
Is  as  that  broken  box  that  gave 

Its  treasure  to  the  Lord, 
And  filled  the  unclean  leper's  house 

\Mth  the  scent  of  costliest  nard. 


Ah !  happy  they  whose  hearts  can  break 

And  peace  of  pardon  win : 
How  else  may  man  make  straight  his  plan 

And  cleanse  his  soul  from  Sin? 
How  else  but  through  a  broken  heart 

^lay  Lord  Christ  enter  in? 

TJic  Ballad  of  Reading  Gaol. 


++ 

Sympathy       OYMPATHY  witli  pain  is  not  the  high- 

^  est  form  of  sympathy.     .     .     Anyone 

can  sympathise  with  the  sufferings  of  a 

friend,  but  it  requires  a  very  fine  nature 

.     to    sympathise    with    a    friend's 


success.     .     .     Sympathy  with  joy  inten- 
sifies the  sum  uf  joy  in  the  world. 
Sympathy  with  pain  does  not  really  dimin- 
ish the  amount  of  pain.    The  Soul  of  Man 
under  Soeialisui. 

++ 

TT  is  always  a  silly  thing  to  give  advice, 
^  hut  to  give  good  advice  is  ahsolutely 
fatal.     The  Portrait  of  Mr.  II '.  H. 

++ 

npO  drift  with  every  passion  till  my  soul 
■*-        Is   a    stringed    lute    on    which    all 
winds  can  play. 
Is  it  for  this  that  I  have  given  away 
Mine  ancient  wisdom,  and  austere  control? 
Methinks  my  life  is  a  twice-written  scroll 
Scrawled  over  on  some  hoyish  holiday 
With  idle  songs  for  pipe  and  virelay, 
\\'hich  do  but  mar  the  secret  of  the  whole. 
Surely  there  was  a  time  I  might  have  trod 
The  sunlit   heights,  and   from   life's   dis- 
sonance 


Good 
Advice 


Individ- 
ualism— 
What  It 
Asks  and 
What  It 
Promises 


It  is  the 
Law  of 
Life 


Struck  one  clear  chord  to  reach  the  ears  of 

God : 
Is  that  time  dead  ?  lo !  with  a  Uttle  rod 
I  did  but  touch  the  honey  of  romance — 
And  must  I  lose  a  soul's  inheritance  ? 

Pocuis. 

++. 

T  XDIVIDUALIS:\I  does  not  come  to 
man  with  any  sickly  cant  about  duty, 
which  merely  means  doing  what  other 
people  want  because  they  want  it;  or  any 
hideous  cant  about  self-sacrifice,  which  is 
merely  a  survival  of  savage  meditation. 
In  fact,  it  does  not  come  to  man  with  any 
claims  upon  him  at  all.  It  comes  naturally 
and  inevitably  out  of  man.  It  is  the  point 
to  which  all  development  tends.  It  is  the 
differentiation  to  which  all  organisms 
grow.  It  is  the  perfection  that  is  inherent 
in  every  mode  of  life,  and  towards  which 
every  mode  of  life  quickens.  And  so  In- 
dividualism exercises  no  compulsion  over 
man.  On  the  contrary,  it  says  to  man  that 
he  should  suffer  no  compulsion  to  be  exer- 


30 


ciscd  ()\cr  him.  It  docs  not  try  to  force 
people  to  be  good.  It  knows  that  people 
are  good  when  they  are  left  alone.  Man 
will  develop  Individualism  out  of  himself. 
Alan  is  now  so  developing  Individualism. 
To  ask  whether  Individualism  is  practical 
is  like  asking  whether  Evolution  is  prac- 
tical. Evolution  is  the  law  of  life,  and 
there  is  no  Evolution  except  towards  In- 
dividualism. Where  this  tendency  is  not 
cx])ressed,  it  is  a  case  of  artificially-ar- 
rested growth,  or  of  disease,  or  of  death. 
TJic  Soul  of  Man  Under  SocialisDi. 

++ 

CELFISHNESS  is  not  living  as  one 
^  wishes  to  live  ;  it  is  asking  others  to  live 
as  one  wishes  to  live.  And  unselfishness 
is  letting  other  people's  lives  alone,  not  in- 
terfering with  them.  Selfishness  always 
aims  at  creating  around  it  an  absolute  uni- 
formity of  type.  Unselfishness  recognises 
infinite  variety  of  type  as  a  delightful 
thing,  accepts  it,  acquiesces  in  it,  enjoys 
it.     TJic  Sou!  of  Mail  U infer  Social isiii. 


Selfish- 
ness and 
Unselfish- 
ness 


31 


;  George 
I  Meredith 


'T^HERE  are  better  artists  in  France 
-*-  but  France  bas  no  one  whose  view  of 
Hfe  is  so  large,  so  varied,  so  imaginatively 
true.  Tbere  are  tellers  of  stories  in  Rus- 
sia who  have  a  more  vivid  sense  of  what 
pain  in  fiction  may  be.  But  to  him  belongs 
philosophy  in  fiction.  His  people  not 
merely  live,  but  they  live  in  thought.  One 
can  see  them  from  myriad  points  of  view. 
They  are  suggestive.  There  is  soul  in 
them  and  around  them.  They  are  inter- 
pretative and  symbolic.  And  he  who  made 
them,  those  wonderful  quickly-moving 
figures,  made  them  for  his  own  pleasure, 
and  has  never  asked  the  public  what  they 
wanted,  has  never  cared  to  know  what 
they  wanted,  has  never  allowed  the  public 
to  dictate  to  him  or  influence  him  in  any 
way.  but  has  gone  on  intensifying  his  own 
personality,  and  producing  his  own  indi- 
vidual work.  The  Soul  of  Man  Under 
Socialism. 


++ 


32 


npHERE  is  the  despot  who  tyrannises 
over  the  body.  There  is  the  despot 
who  tyrannises  over  the  soul.  There  is 
the  despot  who  tyrannises  over  soul  and 
body  alike.  The  first  is  called  the  Prince. 
The  second  is  called  the  Pope.  The  third 
is  called  the  People.  The  Prince  may  be 
cultivated.  Many  Princes  have  been.  Yet 
in  the  Prince  there  is  danger.  One  thinks 
of  Dante  at  the  bitter  feast  in  Verona,  of 
Tasso  in  Ferrara's  madman's  cell.  It  is 
better  for  the  artist  not  to  live  with 
Princes.  The  Pope  may  be  cultivated. 
Many  Popes  have  been ;  the  bad  Popes 
have  been.  The  bad  Popes  loved  Beauty, 
almost  as  passionately,  nay,  with  as  much 
passion  as  the  good  Popes  hated  Thought. 
To  the  wickedness  of  the  Papacy  humanity 
owes  much.  The  goodness  of  the  Papacy 
owes  a  terrible  debt  to  humanity.  Yet, 
though  the  Watican  has  kept  the  rhetoric 
of  its  thunders  and  lost  the  rod  of  its  light- 
ning, it  is  better  for  the  artist  not  to  live 
with  Popes.  .  .  There  is  danger  in 
l\)pes.     And  as  for  the  People,  what  of 


The  Three 
Despots 


The 
Prince, 
The  Pope, 
The 
People 


!!  them  and  their  authority  ?  .  .  .  Their 
authority  is  a  thing  Wind,  deaf,  hideous, 
g-rotesque,  tragic,  amazing,  serious  and 
obscene.  It  is  impossible  for  the  artist  to 
Uve  with  the  People.  All  despots  bribe. 
The  People  bribe  and  brutalise.  Who  told 
them  to  exercise  authority?  They  were 
made  to  live,  to  listen,  and  to  love.  Some- 
one has  done  them  a  great  wrong.  They 
have  marred  themselves  by  imitation  of 
their  inferiors.  They  have  taken  the 
sceptre  of  the  Prince.  How  should  they 
use  it?  They  have  taken  the  triple  tiara 
of  the  Pope.  How  should  they  carry  its 
burden  ?  They  are  as  a  clown  whose  heart 
is  broken.  They  are  as  a  priest  whose 
soul  is  not  yet  born.  Let  all  who  love 
Beauty  pity  them.  Though  they  them- 
selves love  not  Beauty,  yet  let  them  pity 
themselves.  \Mio  taught  them  the  trick 
of  tyranny  ?  The  Soul  of  Man  Under  So- 
cialism. 

++ 


84 


nplIE  past  is  of  no  importance.  The 
^  present  is  of  no  importance.  It  is 
with  the  future  that  we  have  to  deal.  For 
the  past  is  what  man  should  not  have  been. 
The  present  is  what  man  ought  not  to  be. 
The  future  is  what  artists  are.  The  Soul 
of  Mail  Under  Social  ism . 

++ 

I^OR  what  is  a  practical  scheme?  A 
-*■  practical  scheme  is  cither  a  scheme 
that  is  already  in  existence,  or  a  scheme 
that  could  be  carried  out  under  existing 
conditions.  But  it  is  exactly  the  existing 
conditions  that  one  objects  to;  and  any 
scheme  that  could  accept  these  conditions 
is  wrong  and  foolish.  The  conditions  will 
be  done  away  with,  and  human  nature  will 
change.  The  only  thing  that  one  really 
knows  about  human  nature  is  that  it 
changes.  Change  is  the  one  c|uality  we 
can  predicate  of  it.  The  systems  that  fail 
are  those  that  rely  on  the  permanency  of 
human  nature,  and  not  on  its  growth  and 
development.      The  error  of  Louis  XIV 


The  Past, 
The  Pres- 
ent, 

The  Fu- 
ture 


Individ- 
ualism De- 
sirable 
just  be- 
cause it  is 
Unprac- 
tical 


The 

Drama  as 
Art 


The  Work 
of  Art  is 
to   Domi- 
Tiate  the 

I  Spectator: 

I  The  Spec- 

/  tator  is 

!  not  to 
Dominate 
the  Work 
of  Art 


was  that  he  thought  human  nature  would 
always  be  the  same.  The  result  of  his 
error  was  the  French  Revolution.  It  was 
an  admirable  result.  All  the  results  of  the 
mistakes  of  governments  are  quite  admir- 
able.    The  Soul  of  Mail  Under  Socialisjii. 

++ 

A  X  educated  person's  ideas  of  Art  are 
'^  drawn  naturally  from  what  Art  has 
been,  whereas  the  new  work  of  Art  is 
beautiful  by  being  what  Art  has  never 
been ;  and  to  measure  it  by  the  standard 
of  the  past  is  to  measure  it  by  a  standard 
on  the  rejection  of  which  its  real  perfec- 
tion depends.  A  temperament  capable  of 
receiving,  through  an  imaginative  me- 
dium, and  under  imaginative  conditions, 
new^  and  beautiful  impressions  is  the  only 
temperament  that  can  appreciate  a  work 
of  Art.  And  true  as  this  is  in  the  case 
of  the  appreciation  of  sculpture  and  paint- 
ing, it  is  still  more  true  of  the  appreciation 
of  such  arts  as  the  drama.  For  a  picture 
and  a  statue  are  not  at  war  with  Time. 


36 


Tlicy  lake  no  count  of  its  succession.  In 
one  ni<»nient  this  unity  may  he  apprehend- 
ed. Jn  the  case  of  hterature  it  is  chfferent. 
This  must  he  traversed  hefore  the  unity 
of  effect  is  reahzed.  And  so,  in  the  drama, 
there  may  occur  in  the  first  act  of  the  play 
something  whose  real  artistic  value  may 
not  he  evident  to  the  spectator  till  the 
third  or  fourth  act  is  reached.  Is  the  silly 
fellow  to  get  angry  and  call  out,  and  dis- 
turh  the  play,  and  annoy  the  artists  ?  No. 
The  honest  man  is  to  sit  quietly,  and 
know  the  delightful  emotions  of  wonder, 
curiosity,  and  suspense.  He  is  not  to  go 
to  the  play  to  lose  a  vulgar  temper.  He  is 
to  go  to  the  play  to  realise  an  artistic  tem- 
perament. He  is  to  go  to  the  play  to 
gain  an  artistic  temperament.  He  is  one 
who  is  admitted  to  contemplate  the  work 
of  art,  and,  if  the  work  be  fine,  to  forget  in 
its  contemplation  all  the  egotism  that  mars 
him — the  egotism  of  his  ignorance,  or  the 
egotism  of  his  information.  The  Soul  of 
Mcvi  Under  Socialism. 

37 


Beauty  in 
the  Eyes 
of  the 
Public 


The 

Popular 

Novel 


The  Press 


A  FRESH  mode  of  Beauty  is  absolute- 
"^  ly  distasteful  to  the  public,  and  when- 
ever it  appears  they  get  so  angry  and  be- 
wildered that  they  always  use  two  stupid 
expressions — one  is  that  the  work  of  art 
is  grossly  unintelligible ;  the  other  that  the 
work  of  art  is  grossly  immoral.  The  Soul 
of  Man  Under  Soeialisin. 

++ 

'T^HE  popular  novel  that  the  public  calls 
■^  healthy  is  always  a  thoroughly  un- 
healthy production,  and  what  the  public 
calls  an  unhealthy  novel  is  always  a  beau- 
tiful and  healthy  work  of  art.  TJie  Soul  of 
Man  Under  Soeialis]n. 

++ 

T  X  the  old  days  men  had  the  rack.  Xow 
they  have  the  press.  That  is  an  im- 
provement certainly.  But  still  it  is  very 
bad,  and  wrong,  and  demoralising.  Some- 
body— was  it  Burke? — called  journalism 
the  fourth  estate.  That  was  true  at  the 
time,  no  doubt.  But  at  the  present  mo- 
ss 


niciit  it  really  is  the  only  estate.  It  has 
eaten  up  the  other  three.  .  .  we  are 
dominated  by  JournaHsni.  In  Anieriea  the 
President  reigns  for  four  years,  and  Jour- 
nahsm  governs  for  ever  and  ever.  Fortu- 
nately, in  America,  Journalism  has  carried 
its  authority  to  the  grossest  and  most 
brutal  extreme.  As  a  natural  consequence 
it  has  begun  to  create  a  spirit  of  revolt 
.  .  .  it  is  no  longer  the  real  force  it 
was.  It  is  not  seriously  treated. 
In  centuries  before  ours  the  public  nailed 
the  ears  of  journalists  to  the  pump.  That 
was  quite  hideous.  In  this  century  jour- 
nalists have  nailed  their  own  ears  to  the 
key  hole.  .  .  The  journalists  who  are 
most  to  blame  are  not  the  amusing  jour- 
nalists who  write  for  what  are  called  so- 
ciety papers.  The  harm  is  done  by  the 
serious,  thoughtful,  earnest  journalists, 
who  solemnly  .  .  .  drag  before  the 
eyes  of  the  public  .  .  .  the  private 
life  of  man.  The  Soul  of  Man  rndcr  So- 
cialism. 


The  Only, 
not  the 
Fourth 
Kstate 


The  Out- 
come of 
the  Pub- 
lic's   In- 
satiable 
Curiosity 
to  Know 
ICvery- 
thing.  Ex- 
cept what 
is  Worth 
Knowing 


39 


Art  and 
Artists 


A  WORK  of  art  is  the  unique  result  of  a 
'^^  unique  temperament.  Its  beauty 
comes  from  the  fact  that  the  author  is 
what  he  is.  It  has  nothing  to  do  with  the 
fact  that  other  people  want  what  they 
want.  Indeed,  the  moment  that  an  artist 
takes  notice  of  what  other  people  want, 
and  tries  to  supply  the  demand,  he  ceases 
to  be  an  artist,  and  becomes  a  dull  or  an 
amusing  craftsman,  an  honest  or  a  dishon- 
est tradesman.  He  has  no  further  claim 
to  be  considered  as  an  artist.  Art  is  the 
most  intense  mode  of  individualism  that 
the  world  has  known.  I  am  inclined  to 
say  that  it  is  the  only  real  mode  of  indi- 
vidualism that  the  world  has  known. 
Crime,  which,  under  certain  conditions, 
may  seem  to  have  created  individualism, 
must  take  cognisance  of  other  people  and 
interfere  with  them.  But  alone,  without 
any  reference  to  his  neighbour,  without 
any  interference,  the  artist  can  fashion  a 
beautiful  thing:  and  if  he  does  not  do  it 
solely  for  his  own  pleasure,  he  is  not  an 


40 


artist  at  a  I 
rial  is  II  I. 


Tlic  S(^itl  of  Man  I  'iidcr  So- 


+  + 


A  RT  should  never  try  to  be  popular. 
'^^  The  public  should  try  to  make  itself 
artistic  ...  In  England,  the  arts 
that  have  escaped  best  are  the  arts  in 
which  the  public  takes  no  interest  . 
We  have  been  able  to  have  fine  poetry  in 
England  because  the  public  do  not  read  it, 
and  consequently  do  not  influence  it 
The  public  dislike  novelty  because  they  are 
afraid  of  it.  It  represents  to  them  a  mode 
of  Individualism,  an  assertion  on  the  part 
of  the  artist  that  he  selects  his  own  subject, 
and  treats  it  as  he  chooses.  The  public 
are  quite  right  in  their  attitude.  Art  is 
Individualism,  and  Individualism  is  a  dis- 
turbing and  disintegrating  force.  Therein 
lies  its  immense  value.  For  what  it  seeks 
to  disturb  is  monotony  of  type,  slavery  of 
custom,  tyranny  of  habit,  and  the  reduc- 
tion of  man  to  the  level  of  a  machine.  In 
.\rt,  the  i)ublic  accei)t  what  has  been,  be- 


The  Pub- 
lic and 
Art 


The  Pub- 
lic Swal- 
lows its 
Classics 
Whole 
and  Nevei 
Tastes 
Them 


Govern- 
ment De- 
grading 


cause  they  cannot  alter  it,  not  because  they 
appreciate  it.  They  swallow  their  classics 
whole,  and  never  taste  them.  They  endure 
them  as  the  inevitable,  and,  as  they  can- 
not mar  them,  they  mouth  about  them. 
.  .  .  The  public  make  use  of  the  clas- 
sics of  a  country  as  a  means  of  checking 
the  progress  of  art.  They  degrade  the 
classics  into  authorities.  They  use  them 
as  bludgeons  for  preventing  the  free  ex- 
pression of  Beauty  in  new  towns.  TJie 
Soul  of  Mail  Under  SociaI{s}}i. 

++ 

A  LL  modes  of  government  are  failures. 
'^^  Despotism  is  unjust  to  everybody,  in- 
cluding the  despot,  who  was  probably 
made  for  better  things.  Oligarchies  are 
unjust  to  the  many,  and  ochlocracies  are 
unjust  to  the  few.  High  hopes  were  once 
formed  of  democracy ;  but  democracy 
means  simply  the  bludgeoning  of  the 
people  by  the  people  for  the  people.  It  has 
been  found  out.  I  must  say  that  it  was 
high  time,  for  all  authority  is  quite  de- 


43 


grading.  It  degrades  llmsc  \vli<i  exercise 
it,  and  degrades  those  over  whom  it  is 
exercised.  The  Soul  of  Man  L  ^iidcr  So^ 
cialisDi. 

++ 

A  COMMUNITY  is  infinitely  more 
-^^  brutahsed  by  the  habitual  employ- 
ment of  punishment  than  it  is  by  the  oc- 
casional occurrence  of  crime  . 
the  more  punishment  is  inflicted  the  more 
crime  is  produced  .  .  .  The  less  pun- 
ishment the  less  crime.  Where  there  is 
no  punishment  at  all,  crime  will  either 
cease  to  exist,  or,  if  it  occurs,  will  be 
treated  by  physicians  as  a  very  distressing 
iorm  of  dementia,  to  be  cured  by  care  and 
kindness.  For  what  are  called  criminals 
nowadays  are  not  criminals  at  all.  Starva- 
tion, and  not  sin,  is  the  parent  of  modern 
crime.  That  indeed  is  the  reason  why 
our  criminals  are,  as  a  class,  so  absolutely 
uninteresting  from  any  psychological  point 
of  view.  They  are  not  marvellous  Mac- 
beths   and    terrible   Vautrins.      Thev   are 


The  Func- 
tion of  the 
State 


Labour 
and  Ma- 
chinery 


merely  what  ordinary.  respectal:>le,  com- 
monplace people  would  be  if  they  had  not 
got  enough  to  eat.  When  private  property 
is  abolished  there  will  be  no  necessity  for 
crime,  no  demand  for  it.  The  Soul  of  Man 
Under  Social is]iL 

++ 

npHE  state  is  to  make  what  is  useful. 
The  individual  is  to  make  what  is 
beautiful  ...  It  is  mentally  and 
morally  injurious  to  man  to  do  anything 
in  which  he  does  not  find  pleasure.  .  . 
All  unintellectual  labour,  all  monotonous, 
dull  labour,  all  labour  that  deals  with 
dreadful  things  and  involves  unpleas- 
ant conditions,  must  be  done  by 
machinery.  .  .  At  present  machinery 
competes  against  man.  Under  proper  con- 
ditions machinery  will  serve  man  .  . 
just  as  trees  grow  while  the  country 
gentleman  is  asleep,  so  while  Humanity 
will  be  amusing  itself,  or  enjoying  culti- 
vated leisure — which,  and  not  labour,  is 
the    aim   of   man — or    making   beautiful 


44 


things,  or  reading  beautiful  things,  or 
simply  contemplating  the  world  with  ad- 
miration and  delight,  machinery  will  be 
doing  all  the  necessary  and  unpleasant 
work.    The  Soul  of  Mail  Under  Socialism. 


+  + 


a 


l^XOW  Thyself"  was  written  over 
-*-^  the  portal  of  the  antic^ue  world. 
Over  the  portal  of  the  new  world,  ''Be 
Thyself"  shall  be  written.  And  the  mes- 
sage of  Christ  to  man  was  simply  ''Be 
Thyself."    That  is  the  secret  of  Christ. 

++ 

XXT'HEN  Jesus  talks  about  the  poor  he 
^^  simply  me^ns  personalities,  just  as 
when  he  talks  about  the  rich  he  simply 
means  people  who  have  not  developed 
personalities.  Jesus  moved  in  a  commun- 
ity that  allowed  the  accumulation  of  pri- 
vate property  just  as  ours  does,  and  the 
gospel  that  he  preached  was  not  that  in 
such  a  community  it  is  an  advantage  for  a 
man  to  live  on  scanty,  unwholesome  food, 

45 


to  wear  ragged,  unwholesome  clothes,  to 
sleep  in  horrid,  unwholesome  dwellings, 
and  a  disadvantage  for  a  man  to  live  under 
healthy,  pleasant,  and  decent  conditions. 
.  .  .  Wliat  Jesus  meant,  was  this.  He 
said  to  man,  ''You  have  a  wonderful  per- 
sonality. Develop  it.  Be  yourself.  Don't 
imagine  that  your  perfection  lies  in  ac- 
cumulating or  possessing  external  things. 
Your  perfection  is  inside  of  you.  If  only 
you  could  realise  that  you  would  not  want 
to  be  rich.  Ordinary  riches  can  be  stolen 
from  a  man.  Real  riches  cannot.  In  the 
treasury-house  of  your  soul  there  are  in- 
finitely precious  things,  that  may  not  be 
taken  from  you.  And  so,  try  to  so  shape 
your  life  that  external  things  will  not 
harm  you.  And  try  also  to  get  rid  of  per- 
sonal property.  It  involves  sordid  preoccu- 
pation, endless  industry,  continual  wrong. 
Personal  property  hinders  Individualism 
at  every  step.     .     . 

++ 


46 


nplIERE  is  only  one  class  in  the  com-  '  ^^^J''^ 
niunity  that  thinks  more  about  money  Riches 
than  the  rich,  and  that  is  the  poor.  The 
poor  can  think  of  nothing  else.  That  is 
the  misery  of  being  poor.  What  Jesus 
does  say  is  that  man  reaches  his  perfection, 
not  through  what  he  has,  not  even  through 
what  he  does,  but  entirely  through  what 
he  is.   The  Soul  of  Man  Under  Socialism. 


N 


++ 

AY,  let  us  walk  from  fire  unto  fire 
From  passionate  pain  to   deadlier 


delight, 


I  am  too  young  to  live  without  desire, 
Too  young  art  thou  to  waste  this  sum- 
mer night 
Asking  those  idle  questions  which  of  old 
Man  sought  of  seer  and  oracle,  and  no 
reply  was  told. 

For,  sweet,  to  feel  is  better  than  to  know, 

And  wisdom  is  a  childless  heritage. 
One  pulse  of  passion — youth's  first  fiery 
glow,— 


Man's 
Kinship 
with  Na- 
ture: His 
Immortal- 
ity 


Are  worth  llie  hoarded  proverbs  of  the 
sage : 
\>x  not  thy  soul  with  dead  philosophy. 
Have  we  not  lips  to  kiss  with,  hearts  to 
love,  and  eyes  to  see ! 

Panthca.     Poems. 

++ 

V\/'E  are  resolved  into  the  supreme  air, 
\\t  are  made   one  with   what   we 
touch  and  see, 
With  our  heart's  blood  each  crimson  sun 
is  fair, 
With  our  young  lives  each  spring  im- 
passioned tree 
Flames  into  P:reen,  the  wildest  beasts  that 


The  moor  our  kinsman  are,  all  life  is  one, 
and  all  is  change. 

With  beat  of  systole  and  diastole 

Our   grand   great   life   throbs   through 
earth's  giant  heart, 
And  mighty  waves  of  single  Being  roll 
From  nerveless  germ  to  man,  for  we 
are  part 


48 


Of  every  njck  aiul  bird  and  beast  and  bill, 
One  witb  tbc  tilings  tbat  prey  on  us,  and 
une  witb  wbat  we  kill. 

b'runi  lower  cells  of  waking'  life  we  pass 
To    full    perfection ;    tbus    tbe    world 
grows  old : 
We  wbo  are  godlike  now  were  once  a  man 
Of  quivering  purple  decked  witb  bars 
of  gold, 
Gnsentient  or  of  joy  or  misery, 
And   tossed   in   terrible   tangles   of   some 
wild  and  wind-swept  sea. 

Tbis    bot    bard    llame    witb    wbicb    our 

bodies  burn 
Will   make   some   meadow   blaze   witb 

daffodil 
Ay !  and  tbose  august  breasts  of  tbine  will 

turn 
Tn  water-lilies  ;  tbe  l)rown  fields  men  till 
Will  be  more  fruitful  for  our  kne  to-nigbt, 
Xotbing  is  lost  in  nature,  all  tbings  Hve 

in  Deatb's  despite. 


49 


So  when  men  bury  us  beneath  the  yew 
Thy  crimson-stained  mouth  a  rose  will 
be, 
And  thy  soft  eyes  lush  bluebells  dimmed 
with  dew, 
And  w^hen  the  white  narcissus  wanton- 

'y    .    . 

Kisses  the  wind  its  playmate  some  faint 

joy 
Will  thrill  our  dust,  and  we  will  be  again 

fond  maid  and  bov. 


And  we  two  lovers  shall  not  sit  afar, 

Critics  of  nature,  but  the  joyous  sea 
Shall  be  our  raiment,  and  the  bearded  star 
Shoot  arrows  at  our  pleasure !  We  shall 
be 
Part  of  the  mighty  universal  whole. 
And  through  all   ?eons  mix  and  mingle 
with  the  Kosmic  Soul ! 

We  shall  be  notes  in  that  great  Symphony 
Whose    cadence    circles    through    the 
rhythmic  spheres, 

50 


And  all  the  live  World's  throbbing  heart 
shall  be 
One  with  our  heart,  the  stealthy  creep- 
ing years 

Have  lost  their  terrors  now,  we  shall  not 
die. 

The  Universe  itself  shall  be  our  Immor- 
tality. 

Paiifhca.     Poems. 
++ 


But  we,  burnt  out  and  cold, 

See  Honour  smitten   on   the  cheek,   and 

gyves 
Bind  the  sweet  feet  of  ]\lercy :  Poverty 
Creeps  through  our  sunless  lanes  and  with 

sharp  knives 
Cuts    the    warm    throats    of    children 

stealthily. 
And  no  word  said  : — O  we  are  wretched 

men 
Unworthy  of  our  great  inheritance !  where 

is  the  pen 


The  Evils 
'  of  Modern 
;  Society 


Of    austere    Milton?    \vhere    the    mighty 

sword 
\Miich  slew  its  master  righteously  ?  the 

years 
Have  .lost   their    ancient    leader,    and    no 

word 
Breaks  from  the  voiceless  tripod  on  our 

ears : 
While  as  a  ruined  mother  in  some  spasm 
Bears  a  base  child  and  loathes  it,  so  our 

best  enthusiasm 

Genders  unlawful  children,  Anarchy 
Freedom's  own  Judas,  the  vile  prodigal 

License  who  steals  the  gold  of  Liberty 
And  yet  has  nothing.  Ignorance  the  real 

One  Fratricide  since  Cain,  Envy  the  asp 

That   stings   itself   to   Anguish,    Avarice 
whose  palsied  grasp 

Is  in  its  extent  stiffened,  monied  Greed 
For  whose  dull  appetite  men  w^aste  away 

Amid  the  whirr  of  wheels  and  are  the  seed 
Of  things  which  slay  their  sower,  these 
each  dav 


52 


Sees  rife  in  luigland,  and  the  gentle  feet 
Of  beauty  tread  no  more  the  stones  of  each 
unlovely  street. 

JIuiiiaiiitail.     Pooiis. 

++ 

• 
"\/TY  own  experience  is  that  the  more 
"*'  we  study  Art,  the  less  we  care  for 
Nature.  What  Art  really  reveals  to  us  is 
Nature's  lack  of  design,  her  curious  crudi- 
ties, her  extraordinary  monotony,  her  ab- 
solute unfinished  condition.  Nature  has 
good  intentions,  of  course,  but  as  Aris- 
totle once  said,  she  cannot  carry  them  out. 
It  is  fortunate  for  us.  however, 
that  Nature  is  so  imperfect,  as  otherwise 
we  should  have  had  no  Art  at  all.  Art  is 
our  spirited  protest,  our  gallant  attempt 
to  teach  Nature  her  proper  place.  As  for 
the  infinite  variety  of  Nature,  that  is  a 
]mre  myth.  It  is  not  to  be  found  in  Na- 
ture herself.  It  resides  in  the  imagination, 
or  fancy,  or  cultivated  blindness  of  the 
man  who  looks  at  her.  Iiifriilions.  The 
Decay  of  Lying. 


Art  and 
Nature 


Consist- 
ency 


Henry 
James 


Hall 
Caine 


XXZHO  wants  to  be  consistent?  The 
^  ^  dullard  and  the  doctrinaire,  the  te- 
dious people  who  carry  out  their  principles 
to  the  bitter  end  of  action,  to  the  redncfio 
ad  absurd  11  111  of  practice.  Not  I.  Like 
Emerson,  I  write  over  the  door  of  my 
library  the  word  ''Whim."  Intentions. 
The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 

IV^R.  Henry  James  writes  fiction  as  if 
-*■'*•  it  were  a  painful  duty,  and  wastes 
upon  mean  motives  and  imperceptible 
'points  of  view'  his  neat  literary  style,  his 
felicitous  phases,  his  swift  and  caustic 
satire.  Intentions.  The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 

TVyf  R.  Hall  Caine,  it  is  true,  aims  at  the 
grandiose,  but  then  he  writes  at  the 
top  of  his  voice.  He  is  so  loud  that  one 
cannot  hear  what  he  says.  Intentions. 
The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 


54 


r^NGLAND  is  the  home  of  lost  ideas. 
-^-^  As  for  that  great  and  daily  increasing 
school  of  novelists  for  whom  the  sun  al- 
ways rises  in  the  East  End,  the  only  thing 
that  can  be  said  about  them  is  that  they 
find  life  crude,  and  leave  it  raw.  Inten- 
tions.   The  Decay  of  Lying. 

"\y4'  ZOLA,  true  to  the  lofty  principle 
'*'  that  he  lays  down  in  one  of  his  pro- 
nunciamentos  on  literature,  'L'homme  de 
genie  n'a  jamais  d'esprit,'  is  determined 
to  show  that,  if  he  has  not  got  genius,  he 
can  at  least  be  dull.  And  how  well  he 
succeeds !  He  is  not  without  power.  In- 
deed at  times,  as  in  Germinal,  there  is 
something  almost  epic  in  his  work.  But 
his  work  is  entirely  wrong  from  beginning 
to  end,  and  wrong  not  on  the  ground  of 
morals,  but  on  the  ground  of  art.  From 
any  ethical  standpoint  it  is  just  what  it 
should  be.  The  author  is  perfectly  truth- 
ful, and  describes  things  exactly  as  they 
happen.     What  more  can  any  moralist  de- 


People- 
Real  and 
Ideal 


sire?  \\>  have  no  sympathy  at  all  with 
the  moral  indignation  of  our  time  against 
M.  Zola.  It  is  simply  the  indignation  of 
TartufTe  on  being  exposed.  But  from  the 
standpoint  of  art,  what  can  be  said  in  fa- 
vour of  the  author  of  L'Assomuioir,  Nana, 
and  Pot-Bouille?  Nothing.  Mr.  Rus- 
kin  once  described  the  characters  in 
George  Eliot's  novels  as  being  like  the 
sweepings  of  a  Pentonville  omnibus,  but 
Isl.  Zola's  characters  are  much  worse.  They 
have  their  dreary  vices  and  their  drearier 
virtues.  The  record  of  their  lives  is  ab- 
solutely without  interest.  \\'ho  cares 
what  happens  to  them?  In  literature  we 
require  distinction,  charm,  beauty,  and 
imaginative  power.  W^  don't  want  to  be 
harrowed  and  disgusted  with  an  account 
of  the  doings  of  the  lower  orders.  Inten- 
tions. The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 
'T^HE  only  real  people  are  the  people 


ho  never  existed. 


The  justi- 


fication of  a  character  in  a  novel  is  not 


56 


that  other  persons  are  what  thc\-  are,  but 
that  the  auth(jr  is  wliat  he  is.  .  .  In 
point  of  fact  what  is  interesting'  about 
people  in  good  society  .  .  is  the  mask 
that  each  one  of  them  wears,  not  the  real- 
ity that  lies  behind  the  mask,  hitcntions. 
The  Decay  of  Lyuig. 

++ 


Alii  Meredith  I  Who  can  define  him  ? 
^^  His  style  is  chaos  illumined  by 
dashes  of  lightning.  As  a  writer  he  has 
mastered  everything  except  language:  as 
a  novelist  he  can  do  everything,  except  tell 
a  story :  as  an  artist  he  is  everything,  ex- 
cept articulate.  Somebody  in  Shakespeare 
— Touchstone,  I  think — talks  about  a  man 
who  is  always  breaking"  his  shins  over  his 
own  wit,  and  it  seems  to  me  that  this 
might  serve  as  a  basis  for  a  criticism  of 
Meredith's  method.  But  whatever  he  is, 
he  is  not  a  realist.  Or,  rather,  I  would  say 
that  he  is  a  child  of  realism  who  is  not  on 
speaking  terms  with  his  father.     Hy  delib- 


George 
Meredith 


57 


Balzac 


erate  choice  he  has  made  himself  a  roman- 
ticist. He  has  refused  to  bow  the  knee  to 
Baal  and  after  all,  even  if  the  man's  line 
spirit  did  not  revolt  against  the  noisy  as- 
sertions of  realism,  his  style  would  be 
quite  sufficient  of  itself  to  keep  life  at  a 
respectful  distance.  By  its  means  he  has 
planted  round  his  garden  a  hedge  full  of 
thorns,  and  red  with  wonderful  roses. 
Intentions.    The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 

A  S  for  Balzac,  he  was  a  most  remark- 
"^^  able  combination  of  the  artistic  tem- 
perament with  the  scientific  spirit.  The 
latter  he  bequeathed  to  his  disciples :  the 
former  was  entirely  his  own.  The  differ- 
ence between  such  a  book  as  ^1.  Zola's 
U  Assommoir  and  Balzac's  Illusions 
Per  dues  is  the  difference  between  unim- 
aginate  realism  and  imaginative  reality, 
"AH  Balzac's  characters,"  said  Baudelaire, 
''are  gifted  with  the  same  ardour  of  life 
that  animated  himself.  All  his  fictions  are 
as  deeply  coloured  as  dreams.     Each  mind 

58 


is  a  weapon  loaded  to  the  iiinzzle  with  will. 
The  very  scullions  have  f^enius."  A 
steady  course  of  Balzac  reduces  our  livinj;- 
friends  to  shadows,  and  our  acquaintances 
to  the  shadows  of  shades.  His  characters 
have  a  kind  of  fervent  fiery-colored  exist- 
ence. They  dominate  us,  and  defy  scepti- 
cism. One  of  the  greatest  tragedies  of  my 
life  is  the  death  of  Lucien  de  Rubempre.  It 
is  a  grief  from  which  I  have  never  been 
able  to  completely  rid  myself.  It  haunts 
me  in  my  moments  of  pleasure.  I  remem- 
ber it  when  I  laugh.  But  Balzac  is  no 
more  a  realist  than  Holbein  was.  He 
created  life,  he  did  not  copy  it.  I  admit, 
however,  that  he  set  far  too  high  a  value 
on  modernity  of  form,  and  that,  conse- 
quently, there  is  no  book  of  his  that,  as  an 
artistic  masterpiece,  can  rank  with  Salani- 
bo  or  Esmond,  or  The  Cloister  and  The 
Hearth,  or  the  Vieomte  de  Brageh^nne. 
Intentions.    The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 


The  In- 
fluence of 
Art  on 
Life 


Nature 
and  Life 


The 

Stages  of 
Art's  De- 
velopment 


'T^  HE  popular  cry  of  our  time  is  'Let  us 
''•  return  to  Life  and  Nature ;  they  will 
recreate  Art  for  us,  and  send  the  red  blood 
coursing  through*  our  veins ;  they  will  shoe 
her  feet  with  swiftness  and  make  her  hand 
strong.'  But,  alas  !  we  are  mistaken  in  our 
amiable  and  well-meaning  efforts. 
Nature  is  always  behind  the  age.  And  as 
for  life,  she  is  the  solvent  that  breaks  up 
Art,  the  enemy  that  lays  waste  her  house. 
.  Art  begins  with  abstract  decora- 
tion, with  purely  imaginative  and  pleasur- 
able work  dealing  with  what  is  unreal  and 
non-existent.  This  is  the  first  stage.  Then 
life  becomes  fascinated  with  this  new  won- 
der, and  asks  to  be  admitted  into  the 
charmed  circle.  Art  takes  life  as  part  of 
her  rough  material,  recreates  it,  and  re- 
fashions it  in  fresh  forms,  is  absolutely 
indifferent  to  fact — invents,  imagines, 
dreams,  and  keeps  between  herself  and 
reality  the  impenetrable  barrier  of  beautiful 
style,  of  decorative  or  ideal  treatment. 
The  third  stage  is  where  Life  gets  the 
upper  hand,  and  drives  Art  out  into  the 


60 


wilderness.  This  is  the  true  decadence, 
and  it  is  from  this  that  we  are  now  su tier- 
ing ...  A  cultured  Mahomedan 
once  remarked  to  us,  'You  Christians  are 
so  occupied  in  misinterpreting  the  fourth 
commandment  that  you  have  never 
thought  of  making  an  artistic  application 
of  the  second.'  He  was  perfectly  right, 
and  the  whole  truth  of  the  matter  is  this : 
The  proper  school  to  learn  Art  in  is  not 
Life  but  Art.  Intentions.  The  Decay  of 
L\'ing. 

++ 


npHE  characters  in  these  plays  talk 
•^  exactly  as  they  would  talk  off  it ;  they 
have  neither  aspirations  nor  aspirates; 
they  are  taken  directly  from  life  and  re- 
produce its  vulgarity  dow'n  to  the  smallest 
detail ;  they  present  the  gait,  manner,  cos- 
tume, and  accent  of  real  people;  they 
would  pass  unnoticed  in  a  third-class  rail- 
way-carriage. And  yet  how  wearisome 
the  plays  are !  They  do  succeed  in  produc- 
impression   of    reality    at 


ing   even    that 


61 


The 

Coming 

Liar 


which  they  aim,  and  which  is  their  only 
reason  for  existing.  As  a  method,  reaHsm 
is  a  complete  failure. 

Intentions.    The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 

TJ  ORED  by  the  tedious  and  improving 
'*-'  conversation  of  those  who  have 
neither  the  wit  to  exaggerate  nor  the 
genius  to  romance ;  tired  of  the  intelligent 
person  whose  reminiscences  are  always 
based  upon  memory,  whose  statements  are 
invariably  limited  by  probability,  and  who 
is  at  any  time  liable  to  be  corroborated  by 
the  merest  Philistine  who  happens  to  be 
present,  Society  sooner  or  later  must  re- 
turn to  its  lost  leader,  the  cultured  and 
fascinating  liar.  Who  he  was  who  first, 
without  ever  having  gone  out  to  the  rude 
chase,  told  the  wandering  cavemen  at  sun- 
set how  he  had  dragged  the  ^legatherium 
from  the  purple  darkness  of  its  jasper  case, 
or  slain  the  Mammoth  in  single  combat 
and  brought  back  its  gilded  tusks,  we  can- 
not tell,  and  not  one  of  our  modern  an- 


62 


thropologists,  for  all  their  much-boasted 
science,  has  had  the  ordinary  courage  to 
tell  us.  Whatever  was  his  name  or  race, 
he  certainly  was  the  true  founder  of  social 
intercourse.  For  the  aim  of  the  liar  is 
simply  to  charm,  to  delight,  to  give  pleas- 
ure. He  is  the  very  basis  of  civilised  so- 
ciety, and  without  him  a  dinner  party, 
even  at  the  mansions  of  the  great,  is  as 
dull  as  a  lecture  at  the  Royal  Society 
.  .  .  Nor  will  he  be  welcomed  by  so- 
ciety alone.  Art,  breaking  from  the 
prison-house  of  realism,  will  run  to  greet 
him,  and  will  kiss  his  false,  beautiful  lips, 
knowing  that  he  alone  is  in  possession  of 
the  great  secret  of  all  her  manifestations, 
the  secret  that  Truth  is  entirely  and  ab- 
solutely a  matter  of  style ;  while  life^poor 
probable,  uninteresting  human  life  .  .  . 
will  follow  meekly  after  him,  and  try  to 
reproduce,  in  her  own  simple  and  untu- 
tored way,  some  of  the  marvels  of  which 
he  talks.  Intentions.  The  Deeay  of  Lying. 

++ 


Truth — 
Entirely 
and  Ab- 
solutely 
a  Matter 
of  Style 


63 


'I'he 
Power 
of  Art 


A  RT  finds  her  own  perfection  within, 
^^  and  not  outside  of,  herself.  She  is 
not  to  be  judged  by  any  external  standard 
of  resemblance.  She  is  a  veil,  rather  than 
a  mirror.  She  has  flowers  that  no  forests 
know  of,  birds  that  no  woodland  pos- 
sesses. She  makes  and  unmakes  many 
worlds,  and  can  draw  the  moon  from 
heaven  with  a  scarlet  thread.  Hers  are 
the  'forms  more  real  than  living  man,' 
and  hers  the  great  archetypes  of  which 
things  that  have  existence  are  but  unfin- 
ished copies.  Nature  has,  in  her  eyes,  no 
laws,  no  uniformity.  She  can  work 
miracles  at  her  will,  and  when  she  calls 
monsters  from  the  deep  they  come.  She 
can  bid  the  almond  tree  blossom  in  the 
winter,  and  send  the  snow  upon  the  ripe 
cornfield.  At  her  word  the  frost  lays  its 
silver  finger  on  the  burning  mouth  of 
June,  and  the  winged  lions  creep  out  from 
the  hollows  of  the  Lydian  hills.  The 
dryads  peer  from  the  thicket  as  she  passes 
bv,  and  the  brown  fauns  smile  stran^elv 
at  her  when  she  comes  near  them.     She 


64 


has   liawk-faced  gods   that   worship   her, 
and  the  centaurs  gallop  at  her  side. 

Intentions.    The  Decay  of  Lying. 

++ 

A  RT  never  expresses  anything  but  it- 
^^  self  ...  Of  course,  nations  and 
individuals,  with  that  healthy  natural 
vanity  which  is  the  secret  of  existence, 
are  always  under  the  impression  that  it  is 
of  them  that  the  Muses  are  talking,  al- 
wa}s  trying  to  find  in  the  calm  dignity  of 
imaginative  art  some  mirror  of  their  own 
turbid  passions,  always  forgetting  that 
the  singer  of  life  is  not  Apollo  but 
Marsyas.  Remote  from  reality,  and  with 
her  eyes  turned  away  from  the  shadows 
of  the  cave.  Art  reveals  her  own  perfec- 
tion, and  the  wondering  crowd  that 
watches  the  opening  of  the  marvellous, 
many-petalled  rose  fancies  that  it  is  its 
own  history  that  is  being  told  to  it,  its 
own  spirit  that  is  finding  expression  in  a 
new  form.  lUu  it  is  not  so.  11ie  highest  art 
rejects  the  burden  of   the  human   spirit. 


Art  not 
the  ex- 
pression 

of  any 
age,  but 
of  its  own 
Perfec- 
tion 
simply 


65 


Contem- 
plation— 
the  doing 
nothing 
is  the  I 

most  diffi-  I 
cult  thing  j 
to  do 


and  gains  more  from  a  new  medium  or  a 
fresh  material  than  she  does  from  any 
enthusiasm  for  art,  or  from  any  lofty 
passion,  or  from  any  great  awakening  of 
the  human  consciousness.  She  develops 
purely  on  her  own  lines.  She  is  not 
symbolic  of  any  age.  It  is  the  ages  that 
are  her  symbols.  Intentions.  The  Decay 
of  Lyijig. 

++ 

COCIETY  often  forgives  the  criminal; 
^  it  never  forgives  the  dreamer  . 
To  do  nothing  at  all  is  the  most  difficult 
thing  in  the  world,  the  most  difficult  and 
the  most  intellectual.  To  Plato,  with  his 
passion  for  wisdom,  this  was  the  noblest 
form  of  energy.  To  Aristotle,  with  his 
passion  for  knowledge,  this  was  the 
noblest  form  of  energy  also.  It  was  to 
this  that  the  passion  for  holiness  led  the 
saint  and  the  mystic  of  mediaeval  days 
...  It  is  to  do  nothing  that  the  elect  exist. 
Action  is  limited  and  relative.  Unlimited 
and  absolute  is  the  vision  of  him  who 


sits  at  case  and  watches,  who  walks  in 
lonehncss  and  dreams  .  .  .  the  con- 
templative life,  the  life  that  has  for  its  aim 
not  doing  but  being,  and  not  being  mere- 
ly, but  beeoming — that  is  what  the  critical 
spirit  can  give  us.  Intentions.  The  Critic 
as  Artist. 

++ 

\X^1TH  us.  Thought  is  degraded  by  its 
^^  constant  association  with  practice. 
Who  that  moves  in  the  stress  and  tumult 
of  actual  existence,  noisy  politician,  or 
crawling  social  reformer,  or  poor  narrow- 
minded  priest  blinded  by  the  sufferings  of 
that  omnipotent  section  of  the  community 
among  whom  he  has  cast  his  lot,  can  se- 
riously claim  to  be  able  to  form  a  disin- 
terested intellectual  judgment  about  any 
one  thing?  Each  of  the  professions  means 
a  prejudice.  The  necessity  for  a  career 
forces  every  one  to  take  sides.  We  live 
in  the  age  of  the  over-worked,  and  the 
under-educated ;  the  age  in  which  people 
are  so  industrious  that  thev  become  ab- 


The  Prac- 
tical Life     I 
the  way  of  i 
ignorance    | 
Ours  is 
the  age         j 
of  over- 
work and     i 
under-  i 

education 


67 


solutely  stupid  .  .  .  The  sure  way  of 
knowing  nothing  about  hfe  is  to  try  to 
make  oneself  useful.  Intentions.  The 
Critic  as  Artist. 


The  great 
want  of 
modern 
times  is 
unpracti- 
cal people 


Form  is 
the  In- 
spirer  of 
all  Great 
Art 


++ 

XXT'HAT  we  want  are  unpractical  people 
^  ^  who  are  beyond  the  moment,  and 
think  beyond  the  day.  Those  who  try  to 
lead  the  people  can  only  do  so  by  follow- 
ing the  mob.  It  is  through  the  voice  of 
one  crying  in  the  wilderness  that  the  Avays 
of  the  gods  must  be  prepared. 

Intentions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 

TT  is  not  merely  in  art  that  the  body  is 
***  the  soul.  In  every  sphere  of  life  form 
is  the  beginning  of  things.  The  rhythmic 
harmonious  gestures  of  dancing  convey, 
Plato  tells  us,  both  rhythm  and  harmony 
into  the  mind.  Forms  are  the  food  of 
faith,  cried  Newman  in  one  of  those  great 
moments  of  sincerity  that  made  us  admire 
and    know    the    man.        He    was    right, 


68 


though  he  may  not  ha\c  known  how  ter- 
ribly right  he  was.  'J'hc  Creeds  are  be- 
lieved, not  because  they  are  rational,  but 
because  they  are  repeated.  Yes :  Form  is 
everything.  It  is  the  secret  of  life.  Find 
expression  for  a  sorrow,  and  it  will  be- 
come dear  to  you.  Find  expression  for  a 
joy,  and  you  intensify  its  ecstasy.  Do 
you  wish  to  love?  Use  Love's  Litany, 
and  the  words  will  create  the  yearning 
from  which  the  world  fancies  that  they 
spring.  Have  you  a  grief  that  corrodes 
your  heart?  Steep  yourself  in  the 
language  of  grief,  learn  its  utterance  from 
Prince  Hamlet  and  Queen  Constance,  and 
you  will  find  that  mere  expression  is  a 
mode  of  consolation,  and  that  form,  which 
is  the  birth  of  passion,  is  also  the  death  of 
pain.  And  so,  to  return  to  the  sphere 
of  Art,  it  is  form  that  creates  not  merely 
the  critical  temperament,  but  also  the 
aesthetic  instinct,  that  unerring  instinct 
that  reveals  to  one  all  things  under  their 
conditions  of  beauty.  Start  with  the  wor- 
ship of  *  form,  and  there   is  no  secret   in 


The 
I'oet's 
Heal  I'as. 
sii»n  Ruins 
his  Art. 
For  him 
to  be 

Natural  is 
to  be  ob- 
vious, and 
to  be  ob- 
vious is 
to  be  in- 
artistic 


00 


Reforma- 
tion of  the 
People 


art  that  will  not  he  revealed  to  you,  and 
rememher  that  in  criticism,  as  in  creation, 
temperament  is  everything,  and  that  it  is, 
not  by  the  time  of  their  production,  but 
by  the  temperaments  to  which  they  ap- 
peal, that  the  schools  of  art  should  be  his- 
torically grouped. 

Intentions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 
TT   is   always   with   the   best   intentions 

that  the  worst  work  is  done 
when  a  man  reaches  the  age  of  forty,  or 
becomes  a  Royal  Academician,  or  is  elect- 
ed a  member  of  the  Athen?eum  Club,  or 
is  recognized  as  a  popular  novelist,  whose 
books  are  in  great  demand  at  suburban 
railway  stations,  one  may  have  the  amuse- 
ment of  exposing  him,  but  one  cannot 
have  the  pleasure  of  reforming  him.  And 
this  is,  I  dare  say,  very  fortunate  for  him ; 
for  I  have  no  doubt  that  reformation  is  a 
much  more  painful  process  than  punish- 
ment, is  indeed  punishment  in  its  most  ag- 
gravated and  moral  form — a  fact  which 


accounts  for  our  entire  failure  as  a  com- 
munity to  reclaim  that  interesting^  phe- 
nomenon who  is  called  the  conhrmed 
criminal. 

Iiitoitiojis.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 

TT  is  exactly  because  a  man  cannot  do  a 
thing  that  he  is  the  proper  judge  of 
it  .  .  .  Creation  limits,  while  con- 
templation widens,  the  vision  .  .  . 
That  very  concentration  of  vision  that 
makes  a  man  an  artist ;  limits  by  sheer 
intensity  his  faculty  of  fine  appreciation 

.  The  gods  are  hidden  from  each 
other  ...  A  great  artist  cannot 
recognise  the  beauty  of  a  work  different 
from  his  own  .  .  .  The  aesthetic 
critic  and  the  aesthetic  critic  alone,  can 
appreciate  all  forms  and  modes. 

Intent  ions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 

A  S    one  turns   over   the  pages   of   his 

'^  Plain  Talcs  from  the  Tlills,  one  feels 

as  if  one  were  seated  under  a  palm-tree 


Creators 
cannot  be 
Good 
Appre- 
ciators 


Rudyard 
Kipling 


reading  life  by  superb  flashes  of  vulgarity. 
The  bright  colours  of  the  bazaars  dazzle 
one's  eyes.  The  jaded,  second-rate  Anglo- 
Indians  are  in  exquisite  incongruity  with 
their  surroundings.  The  mere  lack  of 
style  in  the  story-teller  gives  an  odd 
journalistic  realism  to  what  he  tells  us. 
From  the  point  of  view  of  literature  Mr. 
Kipling  is  a  genius  who  drops  his  as- 
pirates. From  the  point  of  view  of  life,  he 
is  a  reporter  who  knows  vulgarity  better 
than  any  one  has  ever  known  it.  Dickens 
knew  its  clothes  and  its  comedy.  Mr. 
Kipling  knows  its  essence  and  its  serious- 
ness. He  is  our  first  authority  on  the 
second-rate,  and  has  seen  marvellous 
things  through  key-holes,  and  his  back- 
grounds are  real  works  of  art. 

Intentions,    The  Critic  as  Artist. 


What 

Criticism 

Does 


+  + 

TT  is  Criticism,  as  Arnold  points  out, 
-*■  that  creates  the  intellectual  atmosphere 
of  the  age.  It  is  Criticism  .  .  .  that 
makes  the  mind  a  fine  instrument     . 


It  is  Criticism,  again,  that,  l)y  concentra- 
tion, makes  culture  possible.  It  lakes  the 
cumbersome  mass  of  creative  work,  and 
ehstils  it  into  a  finer  essence  .  .  .  The 
thread  that  is  to  guide  us  across  the  weari- 
some labyrinth  is  in  the  hands  of  Criti- 
cism. Xay  more,  where  there  is  no 
record,  and  history  is  either  lost  or  was 
never  written,  Criticism  can  recreate  the 
past  for  us  from  the  very  smallest  frag- 
ment of  language  or  art,  just  as  surely  as 
the  man  of  science  can  from  some  tiny 
bone,  or  the  mere  impress  of  a  foot  upon 
a  rock,  recreate  for  us  the  winged  dragon 
or  the  Titan  lizard  that  once  made  the 
earth  shake  beneath  its  tread,  can  call 
BeheuKjth  out  of  his  cave,  and  make 
Leviathan  swim  once  more  across  the 
startled  sea.  Prehistoric  history  belongs 
to  the  philological  and  archaeological 
critic.  It  is  to  him  that  the  origins  of 
things  are  revealed.  The  self-conscious 
deposits  of  an  age  are  nearly  always  mis- 
leading .  .  .  It  is  Criticism  that 
makes    us    cosmopolitan     .     .     .      It    is 


Injustice 

and 

Justice 


War 


only  by  the  cultivation  of  the  habit  of  in- 
tellectual criticism  that  we  shall  be  able 
to  rise  superior  to  race  prejudices  . 
Criticism  will  annihilate  race-prejudices, 
by  insisting  upon  the  unity  of  the  human 
mind  in  the  variety  of  its  forms  . 
It  is  Criticism  that,  recognising  no  posi- 
tion as  final,  and  refusing  to  bind  itself 
by  the  shallow  shibboleths  of  any  sect  or 
school,  creates  that  serene  philosophic 
temper  which  loves  truth  for  its  own 
sake,  and  loves  it  not  the  less  because  it 
knows  it  to  be  unattainable. 

Lit  cut  ions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 

'HP HERE  is  only  one  thing  worse  than 

-"-    Injustice,  and  that  is  Justice  without 

her  sword  in  her  hand.     \Mien  Right  is 

not  jMight,  it  is  Evil. 

Intentions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 

TF  we  are  tempted  to  make  war  upon 
-■•  another  nation,  we  shall  remember 
that  we  are  seeking  to  destroy  an  element 


74 


of  our  own  culture,  and  possibly  its  most 
important  element.  As  long  as  war  is 
regarded  as  wicked,  it  will  always  have  its 
fascination.  When  it  is  looked  upon  as 
vulvar,  it  will  cease  to  be  popular. 

Ijifciitioiis.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

++ 

ZpSTHETICS  are  higher  than  Ethics. 
J.±^  They  belong  to  a  more  spiritual 
sphere.  To  discern  the  beauty  of  a  thing 
is  the  finest  point  to  which  we  can  arrive. 
Even  a  colour-sense  is  more  important, 
in  the  development  of  the  individual,  than 
a  sense  of  right  and  wrong.  ^Esthetics, 
in  fact,  are  to  Ethics,  in  the  sphere  of  con- 
scious civilization,  what,  in  the  sphere  of 
the  external  world,  sexual  is  to  natural 
selection.  Ethics,  like  natural  selection, 
make  existence  possible.  ^Esthetics,  like 
sexual  selection,  make  life  lovely  and  won- 
derful, fill  it  with  new  forms,  and  give  it 
progress,  and  variety,  and  change. 

I  lit  cut  ions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

+  + 


^^sthetics 

versus 

Ethics 


75 


It  is  not 
the  mo- 
ment that 
makes  the 
man,  but 
the  man 
who 
creates 
the  age 


The  Critic 
as  Creator 


A  N  age  that  has  no  criticism  is  either 
'^^  an  age  in  which  art  is  immobile,  hier- 
atic, and  confined  to  the  reproduction  of 
formal  types,  or  an  age  that  possesses  no 
art  at  all.  There  have  been  critical  ages 
that  have  not  been  creative,  in  the  ordi- 
nary sense  of  the  word,  ages  in  which  the 
spirit  of  man  has  sought  to  set  in  order 
the  treasures  of  his  treasure-house,  to 
separate  the  gold  from  the  silver,  and  the 
silver  from  the  lead,  to  count  over  the 
jewels,  and  to  give  names  to  the  pearls. 
But  there  has  never  been  a  creative  age 
that  has  not  been  critical  also.  For  it  is 
the  critical  faculty  that  invents  fresh 
forms.  The  tendency  of  creation  is  to  re- 
peat itself.  It  is  to  the  critical  instinct 
that  we  owe  each  new  school  that  springs 
up,  each  new  mould  that  art  finds  ready 
to  its  hand. 

Intentions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 


I 


++ 

T  is  very  much  more  difficult  to  talk 
about  a  thing  than  to  do  it     . 


Anybody  can  make  history.  Only  a  great 
man  can  write  it  .  .  .  The  one  duty 
we  owe  to  history  is  to  rewrite  it  .  .  . 
It  is  because  Humanity  has  never  known 
where  it  was  going  that  it  has  been  able 
to  find  its  way  .  .  .  When  man  acts 
he  is  a  puppet.  When  he  describes  he  is 
a  poet.  The  whole  secret  lies  in  that.  It 
was  easy  enough  on  the  sandy  plains  by 
windy  llion  to  send  the  notched  arrow 
from  the  painted  bow,  or  to  hurl  against 
the  shield  of  hide  and  tlame-like  brass  the 
long  ash-handled  spear.  It  was  easy  for 
the  adulterous  queen  to  spread  the  Tyrian 
carpets  for  her  lord,  and  then,  as  he  lay 
couched  in  the  marble  bath,  to  throw  over 
his  head  the  purple  net,  and  call  to  her 
smooth-faced  lover  to  stab  through  the 
meshes  at  the  heart  that  should  have 
broken,  at  Aulis.  For  Antigone  even 
with  death  waiting  for  her  as  her  bride- 
groom, it  was  easy  to  pass  through  the 
tainted  air  at  noon,  and  climb  the  hill,  and 
strew  with  kindly  earth  the  wretched 
naked    corse    that    had    no    tumb.     But 


77 


The  Writ- 
ing of  His- 
tory 


Acting 
and  De- 
scribing 


The 

World  IS 
Made  by 
the  Singer 
for  the 
Dreamer 


what  of  those  who  write  about  these 
things?  What  of  those  who  gave  them 
reaUty,  and  made  them  live  forever?  Are 
they  not  greater  than  the  men  and  women 
they  sing  of?  "Hector  that  sweet  knight 
is  dead,"  and  Lucian  tells  us  how  in  the 
dim  underworld  Menippus  saw  the  bleach- 
ing skull  of  Helen,  and  marvelled  that  it 
was  for  so  grim  a  favour  that  all  those 
honoured  ships  were  launched,  those  beau- 
tiful mailed  men  laid  low,  those  towered 
cities  brought  to  dust.  Yet  every  day  the 
swan-like  daughter  of  Leda  comes  out  on 
the  battlements,  and  looks  down  at  the  tide 
of  war.  The  graybeards  wonder  at  her 
loveliness,  and  she  stands  by  the  side  of 
the  king.  In  his  chamber  of  stained  ivory 
lies  her  leman.  He  is  polishing  his  dainty 
armour,  and  combing  the  scarlet  plume. 
With  squire  and  page,  her  husband  passes 
from  tent  to  tent.  She  can  see  his  Ijright 
hair,  and  hears,  or  fancies  that  she  hears, 
that  clear  cold  voice.  In  the  courtyard 
below,  the  son  of  Priam  is  buckling  on  his 
brazen    cuirass.       Tlie     white    arms    of 


78 


Andrumaclie  are  around  his  neck.  He  sets 
his  helmet  on  the  ground,  lest  their  babe 
should  be  frightened.  Behind  the  em- 
broidered curtains  of  his  pavilion  sits 
Achilles,  in  perfumed  raiment,  while  in 
harness  of  gilt  and  silver,  the  friend  of  his 
soul  arrays  himself  to  go  forth  to  the 
fight.  From  a  curiously  carven  chest  that 
his  mother  Thetis  had  brought  to  his  ship- 
side,  the  Lord  of  the  Myrmidons  takes 
out  that  mystic  chalice  that  the  lip  of  man 
had  never  touched,  and  cleanses  it  with 
brimstone,  and  with  fresh  water  cools  it, 
and,  having  washed  his  hands,  fills  with 
black  wine  its  burnished  hollow,  and  spills 
the  thick  grape-blood  upon  the  ground  in 
honour  of  Him  whom  at  Dodona  bare- 
footed prophets  worshipped,  and  prays  to 
Him,  and  knows  not  that  he  prays  in  vain, 
and  that  by  the  hands  of  two  Knights 
from  Troy,  Panthous's  son,  Euphorbus, 
whose  lovelocks  were  looped  with  gold, 
and  the  Priamid,  the  lion-hearted,  Patrok- 
lus,  the  comrade  of  comrades,  must  meet 

his  doom.     Phantoms,  are  they?    Heroes 
_ 


Litera- 
ture the 
highest 
and 

greatest  of 
the  visible 
arts 


of  mist  and  mountain?  Shadows  in  a 
song?  No :  they  are  real.  Action!  What 
is  action?  It  dies  at  the  moment  of  the 
energy.  It  is  a  bare  concession  to  fact. 
The  world  is  made  by  the  singer  for  the 
dreamer     . 

On  the  mouldering  citadel  of  Troy  lies 
the  lizard  like  a  thing  of  green  bronze. 
The  owl  has  built  her  nest  in  the  palace  of 
Priam.  Over  the  empty  plain  wander 
shepherd  and  goat  herd  with  their  flocks, 
and  where,  on  the  wine-surfaced,  oily  sea, 
obocp  7:(>vr<K,  as  Homcr  calls  it,  copper- 
pressed  and  streaked  with  vermilion,  the 
great  galleys  of  the  Danaoi  came  in  their 
gleaming  crescent,  the  lonely  tunney-fisher 
sits  in  his  little  boat  and  watches  the  bob- 
bing corks  of  his  net.  Yet,  every  morning 
the  doors  of  the  city  are  thrown  open,  and 
on  foot,  or  in  horse-drawn  chariot,  the 
warriors  go  forth  to  battle,  and  mock  their 
enemies  from  behind  their  iron  masks.  All 
day  long  the  fight  rages,  and  when  night 
comes  the  torches  gleam  by  the  tents,  and 
the  crescent  burns  in  the  hall.    Those  who 


li\'C  ill  marble  or  on  painted  panel,  know  of 
lite  but  a  single  exquisite  instant,  eternal 
indeed  in  its  beauty,  but  limited  to  one 
note  of  passion,  or  one  mood  of  calm. 
Those  whom  the  past  makes  live  have 
their  myriad  emotions  of  joy  and  terror, 
of  courage  and  despair,  of  pleasure  and  of 
suffering.  The  seasons  come  and  go  in 
glad  or  saddening  pageant,  and  with 
winged  or  leaden  feet  the  years  pass  be- 
fore them.  They  have  their  youth  and 
their  manhood,  they  are  children  and  they 
grow  old.  It  is  always  dawn  for  St. 
Helena,  as  Veronese  saw  her  at  the  win- 
dow. Through  the  still  morning  air  the 
angels  bring  her  the  symbol  of  Ciod's 
pain.  The  cool  breezes  of  the  morning  lift 
the  gilt  threads  from  her  brow.  On  that 
little  hill  by  the  city  of  Florence,  where 
the  lovers  of  Giorgione  are  lying,  it  is  al- 
ways the  solstice  of  noon,  of  noon  made  so 
languorous  by  summer  suns  that  hardly 
can  the  slim  naked  girl  dip  into  the  marble 
tank  the  round  Imbble  of  clear  glass,  and 
the  long  fingers  of  the  lute-player  rest  idly 


upon  the  chords.  It  is  twiUght  ahvays  for 
the  dancing-  nymphs  whom  Corot  set  free 
among  the  silver  poplars  of  France.  In 
eternal  twilight  they  move,  those  frail 
diaphanous  figures,  whose  tremulous 
white  feet  seem  not  to  touch  the  dew- 
drenched  grass  they  tread  on.  But  those 
w^ho  walk  in  epos,  drama,  or  romance,  see 
through  the  labouring  months  the  young 
moons  wax  and  wane,  and  watch  the 
night  from  evening  unto  morning  star, 
and  from  sunrise  unto  sunsetting  can  note 
the  shifting  day  with  all  its  gold  and 
shadow.  For  them,  as  for  us,  the  flowers 
bloom  and  wither,  and  the  Earth,  that 
green-tressed  Goddess,  as  Coleridge  calls 
her,  alters  her  raiment  for  their  pleasure. 
The  statue  is  concentrated  to  one  moment 
of  perfection.  The  image  stained  upon 
the  canvas  possesses  no  spiritual  element 
of  growth  or  change.  If  they  know  noth- 
ing of  death,  it  is  because  they  know  little 
of  life,  for  the  secrets  of  life  and  death 
belong  to  those,  and  those  only,  whom  the 
sequence  of  time  affects,  and  who  possess 


not  merely  the  present  but  tlie  future,  and 
can  rise  ur  fall  from  a  past  of  glory  or  of 
shame.  Movement,  that  problem  of  the 
visible  arts,  can  be  truly  realised  by  Lit- 
erature alone.  It  is  Literature  that  shows 
us  the  body  in  its  swiftness  and  the  soul 
in  its  unrest. 

Ijitcntioiis.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 


I 


++ 

T  is  more  fascinating  than  history,  as 
it  is  concerned  simply  with  oneself.  It 
is  more  delightful  than  philosophy,  as  its 
subject  is  concrete  and  not  abstract,  real 
and  not  vague.  It  is  the  only  civilized 
form  of  autobiography,  as  it  deals  not 
with  events,  but  with  the  thoughts  of 
one's  life;  not  with  life's  physical  acci- 
dents of  deed  or  circumstance,  but  with 
the  spiritual  moods  and  imaginative  pas- 
sions of  the  mind  .  .  .  The  highest 
criticism  deals  with  art  not  as  expressive 
but  as  impressive  purely  ...  It 
treats  the  work  of  art  simply  as  a  starting 
point  for  a  new'  creation.     It  does  not  con- 


Criticism 
a  creative 
art,  and 
the  record 
of  one's 
soul 


fine  itself — let  us  at  least  suppose  so  for 
the  moment^— to  discovering  the  real  in- 
tention of  the  artist  and  accepting  that  as 
final.  And  in  this  it  is  right,  for  the 
meaning  of  any  beautiful  created  thing  is, 
at  least,  as  much  in  the  soul  of  him  who 
looks  at  it,  as  it  was  in  his  soul  who 
wrought  it.  Nay,  it  is  rather  the  beholder 
who  lends  to  the  beautiful  thing  its  ac- 
quired meanings,  and  makes  it  marvellous 
for  us,  and  sets  it  in  some  new  relation  to 
the  age,  so  that  it  becomes  a  vital  portion 
of  our  lives  and  a  symbol  of  what  we  pray 
for,  or  perhaps  of  what,  having  prayed 
for,  we  fear  that  we  may  receive  .  .  . 
Beauty  has  as  many  meanings  as  a  man 
has  moods.  Beauty  is  the  symbol  of  sym- 
bols. Beauty  reveals  everything,  because 
it  expresses  nothing.  AMien  it  shows  us 
itself,  it  shows  us  the  whole  fiery-coloured 
world. 

I  lit  cut  ions.     The  Critic  as  Artist. 

+4- 


"C^ROM  his  childhood  lie  had  hecn  as 
"'-  one  filled  with  the  perfect  knowledge 
of  God,  and  even  while  he  was  but  yet  as 
a  lad,  many  of  the  saints  as  well  as  certain 
holy  women  who  dwelt  in  the  free  city  of 
his  birth,  had  been  stirred  to  much  won- 
der by  the  grave  wisdom  of  his  answers. 
And  when  his  parents  had  given  him  the 
robe  and  the  ring  of  manhood  he  kissed 
them,  and  left  them  and  went  out  into 
the  world,  that  he  might  speak  to  the 
world  about  God.  For  there  were  at  that 
time  many  in  the  world  who  either  knew 
not  God  at  all,  or  had  but  an  incomplete 
knowledge  of  Him,  or  worshipped  the 
false  gods  who  dwell  in  groves  and  have 
no  care  of  their  worshippers. 
And  he  set  his  face  to  the  sun  and  jour- 
neyed, walking  without  sandals,  as  he  had 
seen  the  saints  walk,  and  carrying  at  his 
girdle  a  leathern  wallet  and  a  little  water 
bottle  of  burnt  clay. 

And  as  he  walked  along  the  highway  he 
was  full  of  the  joy  that  comes  from  the 
perfect  knowledge  of  God   and  he  sang 


85 


praises  unto  God  without  ceasing;  and 
after  a  time  he  reached  a  strange  land  in 
which  there  were  many  cities. 

And  he  passed  through  eleven  cities. 
And  some  of  these  cities  were  in  valleys, 
and  others  were  by  the  banks  of  great 
rivers,  and  others  were  set  on  hills.  And 
in  each  city  he  found  a  disciple  who  loved 
him  and  followed  him,  and  a  great  multi- 
tude also  of  people  followed  him  from 
each  city,  and  the  knowledge  of  God 
spread  in  the  whole  land,  and  many  of  the 
rulers  were  converted,  and  the  priests  of 
the  temples  in  which  there  were  idols 
found  that  half  of  their  gain  was  gone, 
and  when  they  beat  upon  their  drums  at 
noon  none,  or  but  few,  came  with  pea- 
cocks and  with  offerings  of  flesh  as  had 
been  the  custom  of  the  land  before  his 
coming. 

Yet  the  more  the  people  followed  him,  and 
the  greater  the  number  of  his  disciples, 
the  greater  became  his  sorrow.  And  he 
knew  not  why  his  sorrow  was  so  great. 
For  he  spake  ever  about  God,  and  out  of 

86 


the  fulness  of  that  perfect  knowledge  of 
(jud  which  God  had  himself  given  to  him. 
And  one  evening  he  passed  out  of  the 
eleventh  city,  which  was  a  city  of  Ar- 
menia, and  his  disciples  and  a  great  crowd 
of  people  followed  after  him ;  and  he  went 
np  on  to  a  mountain  and  sat  down  on  a 
rock  that  was  on  the  mountain,  and  his 
disciples  stood  round  him,  and  the  multi- 
tude knelt  in  the  valley. 
And  he  bowed  his  head  in  his  hands  and 
wept,  and  said  to  his  Soul,  'AVhy  is  it 
that  I  am  full  of  sorrow^  and  fear,  and 
tliat  each  of  my  disciples  is  as  an  enemy 
that  walks  in  the  noonday?" 
And  his  Soul  answered  him  and  said, 
*'God  filled  thee  with  the  perfect  knowl- 
edge of  Himself,  and  thou  hast  given  this 
knowledge  away  to  others.  The  pearl  of 
great  price  thou  hast  divided,  and  the  ves- 
ture without  seam  thou  has  parted  asun- 
der. He  wdio  giveth  away  wisdom  rob- 
beth  himself.  He  is  as  one  w^ho  giveth 
his  treasure  to  a  robber.  Is  not  God  wiser 
than  thou   art  ?     \Mio  art  thou   to  give 

87 


away  the  secret  that  God  told  thee?  I 
was  rich  once  and  thou  hast  made  me 
poor.  Once  I  saw  God  and  now  thou  hast 
hidden  Him  from  me." 
And  he  wept  again,  for  he  knew  that  his 
Soul  spake  truth  to  him,  and  that  he  had 
given  to  others  the  perfect  knowledge  of 
God,  and  that  he  was  as  one  clinging  to 
the  skirts  of  God,  and  that  his  faith  was 
leaving  him  by  reason  of  the  number  of 
those  who  believed  in  him. 
And  he  said  to  himself,  *'I  will  talk  no 
more  about  God.  He  who  giveth  away 
wisdom  robbeth  himself." 
And  after  the  space  of  some  hours  his 
disciples  came  near  to  him  and  bowed 
themselves  to  the  ground  and  said,  "Mas- 
ter, talk  to  us  about  God,  for  thou  hast 
the  perfect  knowledge  of  God,  and  no 
man  save  thee  hath  this  knowledge." 
And  he  answered  them  and  said,  ''I  will 
talk  to  you  about  all  other  things  that  are 
in  heaven  and  on  earth,  but  about  God  I 
will  not  talk  to  you.  Neither  now,  nor  at 
any  time,  will  I  talk  to  you  about  God." 


And  they  were  wruth  with  him  and  said 
to  him,  "Thuu  hast  led  us  into  the  desert 
th.at  we  might  hearken  to  thee.  Wilt 
thuu  send  us  away  hungry,  and  the  great 
multitude  that  thou  hast  made  to  follow 
thee?" 

And  he  answered  them  and  said,  "I  will 
not  talk  to  you  about  God." 
And  the  multitude  murmured  against  him 
and  said  to  him,  *'Thou  hast  led  us  into 
the  desert,  and  hast  given  us  no  food  to 
eat.  Talk  to  us  about  God  and  it  will 
suffice  us." 

But  he  answered  them  not  a  word.  For 
he  knew  that  if  he  spake  to  them  about 
God  he  would  give  away  his  treasure. 
And  his  disciples  went  away  sadly,  and 
the  multitude  of  people  returned  to  their 
own  homes.  And  many  died  on  the  way. 
And  when  he  was  alone  he  rose  up  and 
set  his  face  to  the  moon^  and  journeyed 
for  seven  moons,  speaking  to- no  man  nor 
making  any  answer.  And  when  the 
seventh  moon  had  waned  he  reached  that 
desert  which  is  the  desert  of  the  Great 


River.  And  having  found  a  cavern  in 
which  a  Centaur  had  once  dwelt,  he  took 
it  for  his  place  of  dwelling,  and  made  him- 
self a  mat  of  reeds  on  which  to  lie,  and 
became  a  Hermit.  And  every  hour  the 
Hermit  praised  God  that  He  had  suffered 
him  to  keep  some  knowledge  of  Him  and 
His  wonderful  greatness. 
Now,  one  evening,  as  the  Hermit  was 
seated  before  the  cavern  he  had  made  his 
place  of  dwelling,  he  beheld  a  young  man 
of  evil  and  beautiful  face  who  passed  by 
in  mean  apparel  and  with  empty  hands. 
Every  evening  with  empty  hands  the 
young  man  passed  by,  and  every  morning 
he  returned  with  his  hands  full  of  purple 
and  pearls.  For  he  was  a  Robber  and 
robbed  the  caravans  of  the  merchants. 
And  the  Hermit  looked  at  him  and  pitied 
him.  But  he  spake  not  a  word.  For  he 
knew  that  he  who  speaks  a  word  loses  his 
faith. 

And  one  morning  as  the  young  man  re- 
turned with  his  hands  full  of  purple  and 
pearls,    he    stopped    and    frowned    and 

90 


stamped  his  foot  uyxm  the  sand,  and  said 
to  the  Hermit :  "Why  do  ycni  look  at  me 
in  this  manner  ever  as  I  pass  by?  What 
is  it  that  I  see  in  your  eyes?  For  no  man 
has  looked  at  me  before  in  this  manner. 
And  the  thing  is  a  thorn  and  a  trouble  to 
me." 

And  the  Hermit  answered  him  and  said, 
'A\diat  you  see  in  my  eyes  is  pity.  Pity 
is  what  looks  out  at  you  from  my  eyes." 
And  the  young  man  laughed  with  scorn, 
and  cried  to  the  Hermit  in  a  bitter  voice, 
and  said  to  him,  "I  have  purple  and  pearls 
in  my  hands,  and  you  have  but  a  mat  of 
reeds  on  which  to  he.  What  pity  should 
you  have  for  me?  And  for  what  reason 
have  you  this  pity?" 

*'I  have  pity  for  you,"  said  the  Hermit, 
''because  you  have  no  knowledge  of  God." 
"Is  this  knowledge  of  God  a  precious 
thing?"  asked  the  young  man,  and  he 
came  close  to  the  mouth  of  the  cavern. 
"It  is  more  precious  than  all  the  purple 
and  pearls  in  the  world,"  answered  the 
Hermit. 

91 


''And  have  you  got  it?"  said  the  young 
Robher,  and  he  came  ck)ser  still. 
''Once,  indeed,"  answered  the  ilerniit, 
''I  possessed  the  perfect  knowledge  of 
God.  But  in  my  foolishness  I  parted 
with  it,  and  divided  it  amongst  others. 
Yet  even  now  is  such  knowledge  as  re- 
mains to  me  more  precious  than  purple  or 
pearls." 

And  when  the  young  Robber  heard  this 
he  threw  away  the  purple  and  the  pearls 
that  he  was  bearing  in  his  hands,  and 
drawing  a  sharp  sword  of  curved  steel  he 
said  to  the  Hermit,  "Give  me,  forthwith, 
this  knowledge  of  God  that  you  possess, 
or  I  will  surely  slay  you.  Wherefore 
should  I  not  slay  him  w^ho  has  a  treasure 
greater  than  my  treasure?" 
And  the  Hermit  spread  out  his  arms  and 
said,  "Were  it  not  better  for  me  to  go 
unto  the  outermost  courts  of  God  and 
praise  Him,  than  to  live  in  the  world  and 
have  no  knowledge  of  Him?  Slay  me  if 
that  be  your  desire.  But  I  will  not  give 
away  my  knowdedge  of  God." 


And  the  young-  R(jbbcr  knelt  down  and 
besought-  him,  but  the  Hermit  would  not 
talk  to  him  about  God,  nor  give  him  his 
treasure,  and  the  young  Robber  rose  up 
and  said  to  the  Hermit,  "Be  it  as  you 
will.  As  for  me  1  will  go  to  the  City  of 
the  Seven  Sins,  that  is  but  three  days' 
journey  from  this  place,  and  for  my  pur- 
ple they  will  give  me  pleasure,  and  for  my 
pearls  they  will  sell  me  joy."  And  he 
took  up  the  purple  and  the  pearls  and 
went  swiftly  away. 

And  the  Hermit  cried  out  and  followed 
him  and  besought  him.  For  the  space  of 
three  days  he  followed  the  young  Robber 
on  the  road  and  entreated  him  to  return, 
nor  to  enter  into  the  City  of  the  Seven 
Sins. 

And  ever  and  anon  the  young  Robber 
looked  back  at  the  Hermit  and  called  to 
him,  and  said,  'A\'ill  you  give  me  this 
knowledge  of  God  which  is  more  precious 
than  purple  and  pearls?  H  you  will  give 
me  that  I  will  not  enter  the  city." 
And   ever  did   the   Hermit   answer,   "All 

93 


things  that  I  have  I  will  give  thee,  save 
that  one  thing  only.  For  that  thing  it  is 
not  lawful  for  me  to  give  away." 
And  in  the  twilight  of  the  third  day  they 
came  nigh  to  the  great  scarlet  gates  of  the 
City  of  the  Seven  Sins.  And  from  the 
city  there  came  the  noise  of  much  laugh- 
ter. 

And  the  young  Robber  laughed  in  an- 
swer, and  sought  to  knock  at  the  gate. 
And  as  he  did  so  the  Hermit  ran  forward 
and  caught  him  by  the  skirts  of  his  rai- 
ment, and  said  to  him,  ^'Stretch  forth 
your  hands,  and  set  your  arms  around  my 
neck,  and  put  your  ear  close  to  my  lips, 
and  I  will  give  you  what  remains  to  me  of 
the  knowledge  of  God."  And  the  young 
Robber  stopped. 

And  when  the  Hermit  had  given  away 
his  knowledge  of  God,  he  fell  upon  the 
ground  and  wept,  and  a  great  darkness 
hid  from  him  the  city  and  the  young  Rob- 
ber, so  that  he  saw  them  no  more. 
And  as  he  lay  there  weeping  he  was 
aware  of  One  who  was  standing  beside 
— 


him  ;  and  lie  who  was  staiuhnf^  beside  him 
had  feet  of  brass  and  hair  hke  hne  wool. 
And  He  raised  the  Hermit  up,  and  said  to 
him :  ''Before  this  time  thou  had'st  the 
perfect  knowledge  of  God.  Now  thou 
shalt  have  the  perfect  love  of  God.  Where- 
fore art  thou  weeping?"  And  He  kissed 
him.     Poems  ui  Prose. 

++ 

XXZHEN  Narcissus  died  the  pool  of  his 
^  pleasure  changed  from  a  cup  of 
sweet  waters  into  a  cup  of  salt  tears,  and 
the  Oreads  came  weeping  through  the 
woodland  that  they  might  sing  to  the  pool 
and  give  it  comfort. 

And  when  they  saw  that  the  pool  had 
changed  from  a  cup  of  sweet  waters  into 
a  cup  of  salt  tears,  they  loosened  the 
green  tresses  of  their  hair  and  cried  to 
the  pool  and  said,  "We  do  not  wonder 
that  you  should  mourn  in  this  manner  for 
Narcissus,  so  beautiful  was  he." 
''But  was  Narcissus  beautiful?"  said  the 
pool. 

95 


Out  of 
the  strong 
comes 
forth  the      I 
sweet 


"Who  should  know  that  better  than  you?" 
answered  the  Oreads.  "'Us  did  he  ever 
pass  by,  but  you  he  sought  for,  and  would 
lie  on  your  banks  and  look  down  at  you, 
and  in  the  mirror  of  your  waters  he  would 
mirror  his  own  beauty." 
And  the  pool  answered,  ''But  I  loved 
Narcissus  because,  as  he  lay  on  my  banks 
and  looked  down  at  me,  in  the  mirror  of 
his  eyes  I  saw  ever  my  own  beauty  mir- 
rored."    Poems  in  Prose. 

++ 

QNE  evening  there  came  into  his  soul 
the  desire  to  fashion  an  image  of 
THE  PLEASURE  THAT  ABIDETH 
FOR  A  IMOAIENT.  And  he  went  forth 
into  the  world  to  look  for  bronze.  For  he 
could  only  think  in  bronze. 
But  all  the  bronze  of  the  whole  world 
had  disappeared,  nor  anywhere  in  the 
world  was  there  any  bronze  to  be  found, 
save  only  the  bronze  of  the  image  of  THE 
SORROW  THAT  ENDURETH  FOR 
EVER. 


96 


Now 

his  own  hands, 


this  image  he  had  himself,  and  with 


fashioned,  and  had  set  it 


on  the  tomb  of  the  one  thing  he  had  loved 
in  life.  On  the  tomb  of  the  dead  thing 
he  had  most  loved  had  he  set  this  image 
of  his  own  fashioning,  that  it  might  serve 
as  a  sign  of  the  love  of  man  that  dieth 
not,  and  a  symbol  of  the  sorrow  of  man 
that  endureth  for  ever.  And  in  the  whole 
world  there  was  no  other  bronze  save  the 
bronze  of  this  image. 

And  he  took  the  image  he  had  fashioned, 
and  set  it  in  a  great  furnace,  and  gave  it 
to  the  fire. 

And  out  of  the  bronze  of  the  image  of 
THE  SORROW  THAT  ENDURETH 
FOR  EVER  he  fashioned  an  image  of 
THE  PLEASURE  THAT  ABIDETH 
FOR  A  MOMENT.     Poems  in  Prose. 

++ 

"IXTHliN  you  really  want  love,  you  will 
^^     hnd  it  waiting  for  you. 

De  Profundis. 


Pleasure 
is  the 
child  of 
Pain 


The  de- 
sire for 
Love 


97 


Religion  ^TpHE  faith  that  others  give  to  what  is 
■*■  unseen,  I  give  to  what  one  can  touch 
and  look  at.  My  gods  dwell  in  temples 
made  with  hands ;  and  within  the  circle  of 
actual  experience  is  my  creed  made  per- 
fect and  complete :  too  complete,  it  may 
he,  for  like  many  or  all  of  those  who  have 
placed  their  heaven  in  this  earth,  I  have 
found  in  it  not  merely  the  beauty  of 
heaven,  but  the  horror  of  hell  also.  When 
I  think  about  religion  at  all,  I  feel  as  if 
I  would  like  to  found  an  order  for  those 
who  cannot  believe :  the  Confraternity  of 
the  Faithless,  one  might  call  it,  where  on 
an  altar,  on  which  no  taper  burned,  a 
priest,  in  whose  heart  peace  had  no  dwell- 
ing, might  celebrate  with  unblessed  bread 
and  a  chalice  empty  of  wine.  Everything 
to  be  true  must  become  a  religion  .  .  . 
Only  that  is  spiritual  which  makes  its  own 
form.  If  I  may  not  find  its  secret  within 
myself,  I  shall  never  find  it :  if  I  have  not 
got  it  already,  it  will  never  come  to  me. 

De  Profnndis. 
++ 


98 


""^rOT  to  be  niainied,  marred,  and  inconi- 
^^  plete  ...  to  absorb  into  my 
nature  all  that  has  been  done  to  me,  to 
make  it  part  of  me,  to  accept  it  without 
complaint,  fear,  or  reluctance.  The  su- 
preme vice  is  shallowness.  Whatever  is 
realised  is  right  ...  To  regret  one's 
own  experiences  is  to  arrest  one's  own  de- 
velopment. To  deny  one's  own  expe- 
riences is  to  put  a  lie  into  the  lips  of  one's 
own  life.  It  is  no  less  than  a  denial  of  the  | 
soul.  For  just  as  the  body  absorbs  things  | 
of  all  kinds,  things  common  and  unclean 
no  less  than  those  that  the  priest  or  a 
vision  has  cleansed,  and  converts  them 
into  swiftness  or  strength,  into  the  play 
of  beautiful  muscles  and  the  moulding  of 
fair  llesh,  into  the  curves  and  colours  of 
the  hair,  the  lips,  the  eyes ;  so  the  soul  in 
its  turn  has  the  nutritive  functions  also, 
and  can  transform  into  noble  records  of 
thought  and  passions  of  high  import  what 
in  itself  is  iDase,  cruel,  and  degrading; 
nay,  more,  may  find  in  these  its  most 
august  modes  of  assertion,  and  can  often 


Sorro^ 


reveal  itself  most  perfectly  through  what 
was  intended  to  desecrate  or  destroy. 

De  Profiindis. 
++ 

PROSPERITY,  pleasure,  and  success, 
nia}-  be  rough  of  grain  and  common  in 
fibre,  but  sorrow  is  the  most  sensitive  of 
all  created  things.  There  is  no  thing  that 
stirs  in  the  whole  world  of  thought  to 
which  sorrow  does  not  vibrate  in  terrible 
and  exquisite  pulsation.  The  thin  beaten- 
out  leaf  of  tremulous  gold  that  chronicles 
the  direction  of  forces  the  eye  cannot  see 
is  in  comparison  coarse.  It  is  a  wound 
that  bleeds  when  any  hand  but  that  of 
love  touches  it,  and  even  then  must  bleed 
again,  though  not  in  pain. 
^^^lere  there  is  sorrow  there  is  holy 
ground.  Dc  Profnndis. 

++ 

should  wax  and 


I 


S   it   thy   will   that   I 

wane. 
Barter   my   cloth   of   gold   for   hodden 


100 


And  at  thy  pleasure  weave  that  web  of 
pain 
Whose    brightest    threads    are    each    a 
wasted  day? 

Is  it  thy  will — Love  that  I  love  so  well — 
That  my  Soul's  House  shall  be  a  tor- 
tured spot 
Wherein,  like  evil  paramours,  must  dwell 
The  quenchless   tlamc,   the  worm  that 
dieth  not? 


Xay,  if  it  be  thy  will  I  shall  endure. 

And  sell  ambition  at  the  common  mart. 
And  let  dull  fortune  be  mv  vestiture, 


And  sorrow^ 
heart. 


die:  its 


within  mv 


Perchance  it  may  be  better  so — at  least 

I  have  not  made  my  heart  a  heart  of 
stone, 

Xor  starved  my  boyhood  of  its  goodly 
feast. 

Nor  walked  where  Beauty  is  a  thing 
unknown. 


]\lany   a   man   hath   done   so ;   sought   to 
fence 
In  straitened  bonds  the  soul  that  should 
be  free, 
Trodden    the    dusty    roads    of    common 
sense, 
While  all  the  forest  sang  of  liberty, 

Xot  marking  how  the  spotted   hawk   in 
flight 
Passed  on  wide  pinion  through  the  lofty 
air, 
To  where  some  steep  untrodden  mountain 
height 
Caught    the    last    tresses    of    the    Sun 
God's  hair. 

Or  how  the  little  flower  he  trod  upon, 
The  daisy,  that  white-feathered  shield 
of  gold. 
Followed  with  wistful  eyes  the  wandering 
sun 
Content  if  once  its  leaves  were  aureoled. 

But  surely  it  is  something  to  have  been 
The  best  beloved  for  a  little  while, 


102 


'I'o  lia\'e  walked  hand  in  hand  with  Love, 

1 

and  seen 

His  purple  wings  tlit  once  across  thy 

smile. 

Ah !   though   the   gorged   asp  of  passion 

feed 

On  my  hoy's  heart,  yet  have  I  burst  the 

bars, 

Stood  face  to  face  with  Beauty,  known 

indeed 

The  Love  wdiich  moves  the  sun  and  all 

the  stars! 

Poems. 

++ 

A  LL  beautiful  things  belong  to  the  same 
^age. 

Beauty 
can  never 

1  grow  old 

1 

Jutcutio}is.     Pen,  Peiicil,,  and  Poison. 

lOS 


niii'ii  III  I!''  'II  ini'i 


B     000  008  523     3 


